Twilight of Gotham
by Vextra
Summary: The Dark Knight is dead. Jim Gordon is dead. The Joker is presumed dead. One year ago, in a night of terror, the story was broken before it had even truly begun. Barbara Gordon stands alone, scarred by the Joker's poisoned gases, her mind baring deeper wounds. Yet as new and old Villains rise to fill the vacuum, Gotham will need a new Champion. In Twilight, there are only Ghosts.
1. Prologue, Twilight of Gotham

**AUTHOR'S NOTE:**

If you are sensitive to the themes of Depression, Post-Traumatic Stress, Survivor Guilt, Family Abandonment or similar mental traumas and stress, then I advise you to read this story with extreme caution, or to avoid it entirely if you think it could trigger you.

I hope you enjoy my little story, and if you like it please leave a Review or a PM.

**Prologue**

Night-time is pay time, the criminals knew. In Gotham City, night had always been a time of special meaning. For a year now, it was a time of opportunity. A time when any man or woman with disregard for the law and guts could make something of themselves. For some, the lure of a quick pay out negated all other risks. So long as the shadows kept them hidden, they didn't much care what else was involved. Afterall, they do say that the dark hides all evils. But they also say that dead men tell no tales, that the sea hides the dead, and that you shouldn't run before a storm. A smarter crew, more savvy to these cliches, might have thought twice about an offer for a fat pay-out, one that involved accompanying a lunatic across the sea. A smarter crew would have thought not of how good it would be to avoid prying eyes and make an easy score, but thought instead of the sea and storm. A smarter crew would not have accepted any job, no matter how tempting, from a bright-eyed maniac in a pea-green suit.

The sea heaved and sunk, like the great belly of a slumbering beast. Their faces were cold and pallid, etched with the brine of sea-spray. The criminals eyed the beast around them nervously, the sky black and angry with looming clouds. There was no moon or stars, only the ominous pall of a storm yet to break.

The criminals felt deep unease, more than a few retching over the side, their little boat dwarfed by the sea around them. Only their strange employer, strangely unruffled and unflappable in his garish green suit, had his eyes on something other than the storm or the roiling sea. Edward Nigma stared straight ahead, at the looming form of the Prospero Corp Oil Rig. A thin, cruel smile broke his lips. It was a beginning, of sorts. He looked again, unnecessarily, at the briefcase by his side. Everything was proceeding as expected. He had calculated the exact window of opportunity perfectly. That watch-obsessed maniac Fugit wasn't the only person who could plan and execute with perfect timing.

Still, it had come to something, Nigma knew, that his greatest concern was being compared to other fools with strange criminal obsessions. The last year had been more than just a time of opportunity. It had been painfully quiet, too.

He hefted the briefcase in his slender, well-manicured hands, adjusting his weight and composure as the boat rocked and rolled on the sea surf. Keeping perfect poise even in these conditions was trivial for a mind like his. Yet doubt gnawed at him within. Would any of the dunderheads in the GCPD understand the connections? His great fear, now, was that his genius would be wasted on the gum shoes and dull plodders he had to contend with. Once, he had battled wits with the best. Now where was he? Another victim, assuredly, of that Night of terror, almost exactly a year ago. To die so soon, beaten so easily...It made Nigma angry. He had been robbed, cheated, of any chance to finally, completely prove his superiority over that mind. He had barely begun to deploy his full potential, barely composed the first of hundreds of intricate and exquisite riddles and challenges to exhaust and confound his nemesis.

And now his Nemesis was dead. Killed by some laughing fool with too many chemical weapons and not nearly enough sense.

No, Nigma reflected, as the boat came up on its destination. That was the cruellest joke of all. This...Dark Knight, who had only just begun to make his name known, his legend heard, whose battles with minds as great as Edward's, had fallen just as he was in his ascendancy, just as his enemies were coming to know him.

Gotham was a poorer city, he knew, with a touch of nostalgic sadness. It had found a Hero, but before it could truly know its Villains, that Hero had fallen. And a Year of Night had ensued. A year without hope, a year without anything much but the greed and mindless rage of the vermin and scum that crowded the gutters and alleyways of this fallen city. No one had stepped up to don the cape; the legend was still too new, the idea too radical. And so, sensing that there was no champion to fight, the monsters had faded back into the darkness, and faded away, leaving the city to the mercy of the rats and the cockroaches.

It was almost tragic, really. It was also –boring-.

Tonight, Nigma was going to set this injustice right. Gotham needed someone to step into that vacuum. If the Heroes weren't going to answer the Call, he supposed he'd have to become the Villain instead.

He just hoped that his efforts would be truly appreciated.

He smiled, as he felt the air pressure begin to lessen, and his boat and its cargo bumped against the moorings, the Oil Rig looming overhead. The storm was about to break.

Showtime.

* * *

Detective Wills sighed, blinking tired eyes at the dull fuzz of his Lextop computer. He massaged his temples, willing himself to try to focus on the words, which danced in front of him teasingly.

"One of those nights again, Ray?"

The old gumshoe turned, and saw his erstwhile partner, Harvey Bullock coming up with a cardboard tray full of bargain coffee. "The cheap stuff again, Harvey? You know I like Booster Gold Blend."

Bullock shook his head. "Not on our salary, you god-damned hipster."

Wills shrugged, and took the cup of coffee offered to him, lifting the thin spill lid, and sipping the hot black liquid gently. "Whatever. You make any sense of this shit?"

Bullock sat down in the chair opposite Raymond's, squinting at the screen. "That the Prospero case? Oh man, Commissioner Akins must really hate your guts. You got anyone working with you on that one? I'd help but, I got my plate full." He smirked, leaning back in his chair, indicating his in-tray full of papers and photographs.

Wills shot a death-glare at his smug companion. "Maybe you should cut down on the god damn donuts if you're having trouble clearing your plate." He gestured broadly at Bullock's expanding waistline. "They see you lounging around all day; no wonder they dump all the office work on you."

Bullock grunted, his old friend's taunts sliding off of him. Any other man who made a joke about his weight would get their head rammed into a desk, and both men knew it. "Yeah well, at least I'm getting the juicy stuff. An Oil Rig blowing up doesn't seem much of a case to me." He shrugged, and began to sip his own coffee.

Wills exhaled, forced to agree with his partner. There were all sorts of bizarre loose-ends in this damn report, but as far as he could tell the Prospero Rig really had just blown up of its own accord. The company's PR was running damage control, and rumours of terrorist activity were floating around by the Daily Star. The Gotham Post was running a story on industrial negligence, and frankly they probably had better sources than the GCPD did.

Still, something about this incident had set Wills's itch flaring. After all these years, he had a nose for trouble, and something about this, and the looming anniversary, troubled him. Could they be related?

"Hey Harv, you're big into that...conspiracy theory bullshit. Any chance this Oil Rig thing might be some wacko trying to commemorate the ah...anniversary?" Wills asked, immediately regretting it when he saw Bullock's beady eyes light up.

"Hah! Coming round to my way of thinking at last Ray?"

"No, and shut the fuck up. Just wondering if someone half as crazy as you thought this would be, I dunno, some kinda signal or act of worship or something."

"Man you must really be clutching at straws." Bullock sighed sadly. "It's a damn shame seeing a fine cop like you chasing grey ghos-"

Immediately Harvey knew he'd gone too far. The look on Wills face said it all. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean...It wasn't your fault."

"I know that Harvey."

There was an awkward silence, and both men drank their coffee for a while.

"No, I don't think there's any connection." Harvey said at last, more sombrely. "You'd probably know better than me anyway."

Wills nodded, slowly, reluctantly, old wounds throbbing. No, there was nothing...funny about blowing up an Oil Rig. However odd this case was; it had nothing to do with...that night. It just wasn't the right style.

Finishing his coffee, and suddenly sick of trying to make heads or tails of what was probably just an industrial accident, he turned off his computer and began to put on his coat. "Screw this. I've been on duty too many hours already. I'm going home."

Bullock looked at his partner in surprise. The past year, Wills had pulled double overtime constantly, burying himself in work, even busy work like this oil rig case. This was the first time he could remember in a long time of Ray choosing to go home without anyone suggesting it first.

"Yeah, get some sleep, Ray. We'll see you tomorrow. Chief will understand."

Wills didn't respond, simply leaving the police station as quickly as possible, nodding as he passed Montoya on the desk. His head hurt. He didn't want to look at another case-file, another god-damn waste of time.

"You going home?" She exclaimed in surprise. "Its...well, sure. I'll note it in the logbook." Renee Montoya, like Harvey, was one of the old Major Crimes Unit, which Jim Gordon had headed back in the day. All four of them had been Gotham City's rising talent. He sighed. It was sometimes hard for Ray to remember that Renee had been the youngest of them, full of life. She had aged considerably this last year, her eyes bleary and tired, stress-lines clear on her face. He wondered how much shittier he must look.

She, like Harvey, had taken an increasingly back-seat role since that day. They'd been honoured, promoted, and relegated to desk jobs. Wills was the only one still pounding the streets day after day, taking every case that came his way. Even, it seemed, this fucking oil rig business.

Memories threatened to overwhelm Ray, and he ducked out, avoiding Renee's questioning eyes. He didn't have time for this. He just...needed to get away. He got into his car, slamming the throttle on irritably and driving out of there as fast as possible. His apartment was closer to the Narrows, but he wasn't headed that way. On an impulse, he was going to Gordon's. He turned the radio all the way up, drowning out his thoughts. He didn't really know why he was going there. Probably the worst possible place he could go now. He didn't want to think too hard about it, either.

It was early evening by the time he pulled up outside the drive-way, his throat still wet with stale coffee. He was going to have to get that fat asshole to buy some decent coffee for them some time. For all his griping about salaries, he knew that Harvey was just a cheap bastard.

He left his hat and coat in the car, and walked up the crunching driveway. A fresh collection of bouquets had been laid by the door-step. He felt tightness in his throat. The anniversary really was close. Not everyone had forgotten. Not everyone could move on. Maybe coming here had been a bad idea after all.

He was here now, though, and it would be stupid to leave without saying hello, at least. He swallowed his trepidation, and pushed the doorbell button all the way in, the dim echo of a pleasant tune audible even on this side of the door.

There was a sudden barking, and he could hear Fang scrabbling along the carpet beyond. Damn dog.

The door opened slightly on its latch-chain, and Ray recognised Patricia, the social worker.

"Hello, Pat, is Barb able to take visitors?" He forced himself to smile, though he felt like anything but smiling.

Patricia was a young black woman in blue scrubs, and had looked after Barbara since that night. Ray didn't know much about Patricia beyond that she'd interned at Arkham Asylum, and was one of the best carers the city could offer.

"Detective Wills! A pleasant surprise. I'm sure Miss Gordon would love to see you."

"Please, call me Ray." He said uselessly for the umpteenth time. Patricia was a stickler for politeness, and refused to address him any other way.

After being let into the hallway, he let Fang sniff him, and even gave the old Rottweiler a playful scratch behind the ears. It wasn't the dog's fault that his master was gone, and his mistress was...not entirely there, any more.

The house felt unnaturally quiet, autumnal light slanting through the windows and giving the house a faintly orange hue at times. He trod the stairs up to her room, noting the faded photographs on the wall. He tried not to look too closely at the familiar faces.

He knocked quietly on her door. After waiting a while, and getting no answer, he quietly pushed the door open. "Barbara? Is it Ok if I come in?"

She sat in her bedroom, staring blankly out the window at the garden, the rustle of leaves and nature the only sound. She was facing away from him, not that it would have mattered to him. She was wearing a loose grey shirt and dark jeans, all colour removed from her wardrobe. She'd developed a deep aversion to anything that was too bright, though she seemed to be entranced by the colours of the trees outside, fall leaves and light dappling her.

She was the daughter of his boss, his best friend, and he had made a promise to that friend. As far as he was concerned, despite having never married and never fathering any children of his own, Barbara was his daughter now, too, in a way.

"Hello Barb! It's Ray. Pat said it was ok if I could speak to you? How are you feeling today?" He asked brightly, going through the motions. He knew what she was going to say. What she'd always said. How this routine went. But he kept trying. Kept hoping.

She turned, slowly, idly, her eyes sharp, keen, examining him like a hawk. Her eyes were what gave him that hope. There was intelligence there, understanding. Fear and distrust too, but that was better than the alternative.

Her face locked in a painful rictus grin, a smile that was both goofy and frightening at the same time. Her skin covered in a creamy makeup, patchy in places. Her eyes were dark-rings, sore and inflamed. He could see, however, where the makeup had worn off, patches of corpse-white skin. It was a permanent side-effect of the chemicals that she'd...been exposed to, by that monster, on that Night of terrors. Little had changed in the year since then.

"I'm fine." She said, voice dead and without emotion.

Ray nodded, taking her empty words at face value. "That's good! Uh...how's your occupational therapy going?"

"It's going." She responded blandly. Drool began to form around the corners of her curled-back lips.

"Your mother told me you were refusing your facial treatment again." He said more sternly, like he imagined a concerned father would. "You should take better care of your skin, it'll never get better..." He stopped, as he saw the look in her eyes. A spark of anger, almost, followed by a deeper emptiness than he could fathom.

The wind rustled low outside, autumnal leaves brushing against the window-pane. Jim had always talked about cutting back that old tree. A nuisance at night, he'd said.

No one was going to be pruning any branches this year.

"I'm sorry. I...I'm not sure why I came again so soon." He mumbled, feeling awkward. He'd never been married. Never had kids. The job had been all that ever had mattered to him. He didn't know how to talk to this...woman, he supposed. She looked like a scrawny sixteen-year old, thinner and scrawnier than most, but her eyes held depths of maturity that no teenager should ever have had. Her red hair fell around her corpse-pallid face, its once fiery lustre now a dull and faded brick-like colour. They'd spent months washing the bleach out, the green-blonde that that...creature had favoured in all his moppets, his broken columbines and dark jesters.

He crushed the memories ruthlessly. So many lost souls. And yet, somehow, they'd saved one soul. One person at least had escaped that Night. The fire had taken so many others, and the madness and choking gas the rest. Looking into her eyes now, though, he wondered if maybe they'd been wrong to save her. Or whether they'd saved her at all.

"Maybe you shouldn't have come." She said, and her knuckles whitened with effort, as she clung to the sides of her chair.

"Maybe you should never have come at all."

He looked at her with sorrow in his eyes, and felt the war of guilt and shame raging in him, hot sick feelings coursing through his veins like poison. What the hell had he been thinking anyway? Why –was- he here?

"Barbara...I guess...I want to know you'll be ok. At the weekend I mean. You don't have to go through this alone." He said, and he tried to reach out, offering his age-worn hand to hers. She looked at him with eyes filled with pure hatred.

"Alone? A...ha...Alone...A..Ack...A..." She began to cough, her fingernails digging deep into her chair. She threw her head back, her hair limp as her face began to sweat. Her coughing grew worse. No. Laughing. She was...laughing. He grew concerned.

"Pat! I think she's about to have one of her fits again!" He called urgently.

Barbara laughed at him, an unhealthy, maniacal cackle. It sent chills through his spine.

"Alone! Hahahaha! I –wish- I was alone. You never leave me alone! Always someone there! Watching! Why can't I be alone?" Her eyes streamed tears, even as she choked back insane laughter. She tried to rise from her chair, but she was too weak. It hadn't been long since her legs had healed, and walking was still difficult for her. Wills watched in rapt horror.

"Even when I...hah...sleep...aaha...I'm not alone. You're all...hack...still there. Faces, voices. It's like...a night that never ends." Sickly yellow tears ran from her eyes, running along well-worn dark tracks in her face. She had cried much these past few months, almost as much as she had laughed.

Wills felt...hopelessly inadequate. His instincts were to protect her, to try to comfort her, to act like he thought a father or a foster parent should act. But he couldn't be that to her. All he seemed to do was bring up her old pain. His presence reminded her of who wasn't here in his place.

Patricia came in, giving him a stern but sympathetic look, before she took hold of Barbara's hands, forcing them away from the sides of chair, her finger-nails already worn and chipped from how hard she had pressed them into the wood.

"Get the medicine, it's in the cabinet." Patricia said, even as she tried to soothe the tormented teenager.

Wills dumbly nodded, and went to fetch the bottle. Was this how it was always going to be, from now on? He remembered how grim things had felt, before that Night. How it had felt like the breaking of the storm. They had braced for the worst, but even they couldn't have imagined it would have gone that badly. He could still hear the screams, the helpless, maniacal laughter.

He caught a glimpse of himself in the bathroom mirror. An old, worn down man with thinning grey hair and hollow cheeks stared back, thin stubble lining a pock-marked chin. His bloodshot eyes were rimy with the threat of tears. God, he was fucking pathetic now.

He slammed his fist painfully into the wall. A dramatic gesture, but it was the pain he wanted. The physical pain helped wake him up. Get angry. He gritted his teeth, snarling at himself. Always, no matter how bad it had gotten, he had channelled his feelings into rage, into anger. Anger that could be used, tempered. A sword that he could wield, white-hot, to strike down his enemies.

But all his enemies were dead. It was his friends he needed to help now. How?

He took the pills back to the bedroom, where Barbara had stopped her struggles, lolling her head back as Patricia patiently and calmly restrained her in her chair, stopping her hands from flailing about.

"I got the pills." He said gruffly. No, he knew why he had come now. He was sick of burying it, sick of distracting himself on pointless goose chases. He was going to fight his demons.

When Barbara had swallowed the pills, and Patricia had left again, he sat by the troubled girl, and looked in her somewhat sleepy, half-closed eyes. Not with sorrow or shame or imagined paternal concern, but with rage.

"You're wasting your time here, girl. You're Jim Gordon's daughter, for Christ sake. It's probably too fucking late for me and Harv and Renee, but you're still young. Fight it. Fight. I don't know how to be a father but goddamnit, if I was your partner I'd tell you to stop feeling so god damn sorry for yourself, and go out there and raise some hell."

His words were harsh, biting, and they were as much for himself as for the young woman. No doubt a Therapist would be horrified at his approach. He didn't care.

"Take all that sadness and turn it into rage. Make a fist of your pain. I'll be back at the weekend. We'll ride that anniversary out, and neither of us will cry."

He turned and left, not waiting for her to try to respond. She was probably too hazy to have understood half of what he'd said anyway.

"Sleep now. It's nearly night-time." He smiled to himself, though he wasn't sure why.

He left the house, without saying goodbye to Patricia. It was a long drive back.

Barbara stared at the space where he had stood for a long time, before finally closing her eyes. Sleep came, and with it the usual nightmares. She awoke later that night, sweating, shaking. But something was different this time.

She was no longer smiling.


	2. Chapter One, Time to Fight

**Chapter One**

In retrospect, he really should have been the first person to see it. He had plenty of excuses why he hadn't, of course. But it was still galling that it was Harvey, with his typical cocky smirk, who'd found the clue before him. It wasn't even his case.

"You're sure you're not just seeing things? What's the word, Pareidolia?" Ray had asked vainly, easing his aching body into his chair. He was getting older he knew, and he'd not exactly been taking care of himself lately. He picked up his coffee, noting the gold ribbon around it. Cheap bastard was rubbing it in further, getting him the coffee he actually wanted. Like a consolation prize.

"Hell no. I even took the liberty of e-mailing a scientist over it. He said there's little to no chance it's just random. Here, look for yourself." The fat detective gleefully shoved a stack of photos on to Ray's already crowded desk, papers fluttering as he did so.

There was no mistaking it. The Oil slick from the Prospero Rig, stretching out several miles, was forming into a perfect Question mark, with the Rig as the dot. Someone must have spent months studying tides, liquid distribution patterns, and god knows what else to make that shape happen. No doubt the scientists could explain it better, but for Ray, it meant only one thing.

It meant the Lunatics were back.

"What's Prospero saying about all this?" Ray said, breathing calmly, ignoring the rising certainty in his gut for a moment.

Harvey leaned over, his fingers drumming on the divider between their two desks. "Oh the usual bullshit. Honestly, most people think it's just a weird coincidence, like you. But we know better don't we?" Bullock tapped the side of his nose conspiratorially.

Ray struggled to find a rational explanation that was satisfactory. It –could- still be just an Industrial Accident. It was just a question mark, after all, hardly anything that sinister. But for someone who'd cut their teeth in the Major Crimes Unit, who'd been there for the rise of the Dark Knight, who'd seen the crazy shit that had begun to start happening, criminals no longer satisfied with just stealing or wrecking things, but leaving calling cards and signatures...

No, there could be no mistake. Even if no one else recognised it, he couldn't doubt it himself. The last year had been hard, harder than he'd ever admit to himself, but at least they'd not had to deal with the Lunatics. He'd honestly hoped that with the Caped Crusader's death, maybe all the costume-wearing bullshit was over. One good thing to come of that whole mess, at least.

"Have you shown this to Montoya?" Ray asked. If anyone would understand the mindset behind the crazies, it would be Renee Montoya. She'd always seemed to have a knack for this kind of stuff.

"Not yet. It is your case after all, and she's not even in MCU anymore. So you think it is a sign?" Harvey grinned. "What's the betting that we'll start seeing more question marks all over the place?"

Ray glared at his partner sternly. "I'm not taking that bet. And don't you have your own god-damn work to do?" He grumbled sourly. It was bad enough that he'd been stuck working fringe cases like this, it was almost too much that his partner was still ahead of him.

Bullock slumped back down into his chair with a loud creak, his heavy frame straining the suspension. "Yeah, but its all bullshit. Cop Killings. Maybe linked, but honestly, the way things have been going, it could all be random. This fucking city is the pits." He sighed. "I want these bastards as much as anyone, but...I miss the old days."

"No, you really don't." Ray said, disgusted with his partner. "You saw what came of all that...that, republic serial bullshit."

Bullock nodded reluctantly. "Eh, but whilst it was going on...didn't you feel like a real detective for once? Piecing together clues, trying to stay one step ahead? I hated the vigilantism as much as anyone, you know that Ray, but when you brought down some loon with a mask, it felt...more of a victory, you know? I could arrest ten gang-bangers tomorrow and fifty street kids will take their place. There's no cleaning the fucking corners."

Ray conceded the point. "We're not in it for the glory though, Harv. We can't win this war, but we can sure as hell keep it contained. It sucks that the street kids keep returning to the corners, but I rather it was just the corners, than every god-damn neighbourhood."

"And what a swell job of containment we've been doing." Harv said sourly. "You know the latest killing I got to work? Someone managed to drop a fucking police chopper. And not with anything easy like an RPG or whatever, they snagged the fucking rotors with a tow cable. These criminals are getting nasty, Ray. I dunno, if the Lunatics are coming back, at least...at least you knew who to hate, you know?"

Ray shook his head sympathetically, and tried to focus on writing up his report again. There wasn't anything he could really say to that. The thing Harv was trying not to say, the thing they were all trying not to even think. When the Lunatics had run the asylum, at least one of them had been on their side. And somehow, that had made all the difference.

He sipped his coffee, and smiled. At least this stuff didn't taste like ass. He started to type, and the words flowed more readily. He didn't know what the future held, but he could still be a cop. Nothing would get in the way of that.

* * *

Barbara looked at herself in the mirror, ignoring the dent in the wall that Wills had left yesterday. For months she'd been unable to face herself, to really see the person she now was. But there was no mistake. She wasn't imagining things. The death's-head grin she'd been avoiding for so long was gone. She gently felt the sides of her mouth. Rough, scarred, like old leather. But...normal. She tentatively opened her mouth, examining her tongue and her yellowing teeth, before closing again. She didn't dare try to smile, afraid that if she moved it would go back to the way it was.

But it was hard not to feel like smiling- really smiling- on the inside. She could talk somewhat normally again. In certain lights, she could almost pass for a normal person. She ran her hands over her face again, really feeling it. It felt like she was always wearing a mask, and that if she just scratched hard enough, maybe it would peel off. But she knew that wasn't true. That compulsion was dangerous, and more than one victim of the Smilex gas had nearly died trying to remove that "mask".

She looked at the tubs of makeup and facial unguents that crowded her bath-room. If she really wanted to, really made an effort, she could make her face look close to normal. For a few hours at any rate. Pretend for a few moments that she was still the Barbara Gordon she had been. The bright, rising policeman's daughter, both queen of the prom and valedictorian.

But that wasn't who she was now. With the smile gone, her face reflected how she truly felt inside, now. Dead. Unyielding. Empty. Her eyes were still hollow and ringed, and her hair was still thin and scraggly. She'd have to wear a wig if she ever wanted to really look like something other than a Raggedy Ann doll.

There was a gentle knock at the door. Patricia?

"I'll be out soon." She responded woodenly. Patricia wasn't a bad person. But she was a carer. She saw her as a victim. They all did. Or had. Ray's outburst...She found herself dwelling on his words. Maybe it was the lack of anything or anyone else in her life. Maybe it was simply the first time in a long time anyone had really gotten angry at her, had treated her with anything but kid gloves.

She'd felt something then. Something other than shame, other than hate and sorrow. She wanted to feel that way again. Was it anger? Rage? She tried to recapture some of that spark, but found it so hard to care about anything. What was even the point of trying?

She felt the memories intruding again, and she squeezed her eyes shut, and put her hands down around the wash basin. The reason she so often needed to grip something, to hold on to something...it was so hard to stop herself from laughing, from laughing and laughing till her lungs burst and her eyes wept and her hands clawed away every scrap of that mask she called a face.

But this time she wasn't smiling. Knowing that made it...easier, somehow. She practiced the breathing exercises she'd been taught, forcing herself to calmness, to find a place where the memories couldn't touch her. It was so hard not to feel...fear, disgust, and revulsion. When she wasn't laughing she felt like puking. The image that stayed strongest in her mind, was seeing herself, seeing that...transformation...

She ran to the toilet, and retched violently, emptying the little she'd eaten for breakfast. Patricia came in, holding her steady, helping hold her hair back.

"Again?" She said with sad sympathy. Barbara hated herself all over again. Not just because of what that memory meant, what it made her feel. But because how the memory made others treat her. Patricia's patience, kindness and support were always there, and would never diminish. It sickened her to know people saw her as someone so weak.

"Just...leave me alone..."She panted for breath, her whole body shaking violently. "I...I don't need your help." It was feeble resistance, she knew. She'd said the same things over and over, but even she couldn't really believe it. So long as she reacted like this, she wasn't fooling anyone.

Patricia simply nodded, as if what Barbara said was the most reasonable thing in the world. "Of course. Do you want me to make you some more breakfast later?" She asked. "How about some oatmeal? You really enjoy your oatmeal."

Barbara glared at Patricia. Oatmeal was about the only thing she could stomach sometimes. Anything with too much flavour, too much texture or life...it reminded her of that...that damn banquet. Tea party would be a better word. She remembered sitting around a table, a dozen other grinning moppets just like her, while he...he stood there and talked, and laughed. And she'd just sat there, while he'd continued his work, while other girls had served them all cakes and cups of punch...

It was all so surreal, sometimes. Like a childhood nightmare she couldn't wake up from, or ever forget. Oatmeal was safe, secure, and bland.

She wanted to just...fade away. To cut herself off from all the sensations, all the triggers. Maybe she could forget if people stopped reminding her how weak she was. If they all just...left her alone, and forgot, she could sleep in darkness, and never wake up.

She got to her feet, swaying unsteadily, her mouth and throat burning. "Water." She croaked, and Patricia handed her a plastic cup filled with tap water, and probably some more pills dissolved in it as well.

She drank the mixture greedily, and felt the calm wash over her. It was different from the emptiness, from the anhedonia. It was like wrapping herself in a warm blanket, feeling something, something that didn't remind her of that Night, of that monster.

It also let her choose what to remember, what to focus on. And so she relived that moment with Ray's rage, and it helped her feel...something. She wanted more like this. She wanted...she wasn't sure what she wanted. But getting angry, she knew, was something she could do.

As much as she yearned to surrender to the void, swallowed by darkness and for everyone to just go away, she knew that as long as anyone cared, she couldn't have that. So if she really wanted to escape, to get rid of all these well-meaning people, to stop just being a victim, she'd have to find another way out.

She made a fist, clenching her fingers tightly. She remembered her self-defence lessons, a spark from something that seemed a lifetime ago. Useless when it had come down to it, of course, but she still remembered.

"Are you ok, Barbara?" Patricia asked concerned.

She blinked, and looked at the woman. She'd been going into a fighting pose, and it must have looked odd. She looked at the woman, her face still. That, that was still a triumph. Her face was her own again.

"I'm fine." She said, and this time she almost felt like she meant it.

* * *

Raymond Wills adjusted his tie, finding the tuxedo uncomfortable. The anniversary was meant as a commemoration, a celebration of the living as well as a memorial to the fallen. It was also an opportunity for the great and good of Gotham City to shmooze with one another, and to be seen by the public to be caring about what had happened. The fact that the Anniversary was happening at the James Gordon Community Centre, built with public money, was representative of this fact. The survivors and their saviours were almost an after-thought, really. Necessary tokens of a public ceremony to assuage collective guilt, to make those who'd done nothing feel like the grief that still plagued many was a shared grief. He could have refused to attend the ceremony, he supposed, but for his resolve to face his demons, and not keep running away.

He would be damned if he was going to attend this ball in full dress uniform, though. As uncomfortable as a tuxedo was, he was a detective at heart. A uniform made him stand out, and projected an image of himself that he didn't really believe. He preferred to blend in. The last thing he wanted was someone to recognise him and make a fuss of him. He was no Hero. All the Heroes of that Night were dead.

He fiddled with the cuff links, and wondered again about what he'd said to Barbara. He'd talked with Patricia on the phone for an hour, and they'd both been ambivalent about taking her to the ceremony. She still found walking and standing for long periods difficult. But Barbara had been making...progress, of a sort. Apparently, to his suprise, she was no longer smiling. The rictus grin was gone. The doctors had given some sort of explanation, about how it had been mostly psychosomatic or something, but it still felt odd.

He wondered if it was simply the time that had elapsed, or whether his words, rashly spoken, had more of an effect than he realised.

He picked up the invitation, and looked briefly at his holster and side-arm, dangling from its hook by the door. Time was, he'd never have gone anywhere without it, even to an event like this. Time was that would have been simple prudence. But he was getting sick of his paranoia, and he knew his comrades would look sadly at him if he brought a gun to this Anniversary. It would have felt...dishonourable somehow, to the memory of those who had fallen.

A gun would also have been a sign that he was afraid. If Barbara could stop smiling, could make progress of her own, maybe he could beat his own ghosts, too.

So he put on his best aftershave, and managed to look like a human being again. He stepped out into the cold night air. He'd hired a cab for the night. There was no way he was going to end this night sober. He was making an effort he knew, but he wasn't that strong. Not yet.

"Take me out to Belle Drive. I know it's a long way but...we have to pick someone up first." He knew it would be expensive, hiring a cab for this long haul, but he'd made a promise. If she wanted to go, if she felt ready, he would stand side by side with her, and they were going to make it through this Night together.

The cab driver shrugged indifferently. "It's your money, pal."

They sped off into the night. His knuckles whitened, and he forced himself to think about the gala, about the Entrées, about trivial things.

When they pulled up outside the Gordon Residence, he saw with suprise that Barbara was already standing outside, waiting for him. Patricia looked anxious, but Barbara was obviously determined.

Her face took his breath away. She really had stopped smiling. Her grim visage was still nothing normal, but it reminded him painfully of her deceased father. It was the same face Jim had worn, time after time, when the going had really gotten rough. It was a face that said they weren't going to take any prisoners.

She wore no makeup. Her only concession to normality was a wig, a full head of bright henna-coloured hair in a styled bun, like a 1940s movie star. She looked oddly like Katherine Hepburn, though Wills doubted Barbara had any idea who that was.

"You look..." He fumbled for words.

"Pretty?" She said dully, sardonic humour. A deadpan joke, but a joke nonetheless. That alone almost floored him.

"You look strong." He said, and meaning it. For all that her body was still skeletal and her face cadaverous; there was a dignity in her bearing.

The dress she wore was a deep black evening gown, conservative and formal. It was the sort of dress her mother used to wear. Barbara had even found some elbow-length white gloves to cover her arms. It was hard for him not to be astounded at how different she looked from the sickly teenager he had come to know over the last year.

But for all her grace and dignity, it was clear she was still frail, and her timid steps across the lawn towards him reminded him she was still weak.

He wanted to reach out, to help steady her, but he resisted that urge. Instead, he simply waited, and let her make the walk alone.

She gave him a look, and he wasn't sure how to interpret it.

"Are you ready to go schmooze with the mayor?" He joked. "It'll be a dull evening. Let me know if you feel like you're dropping off." His tone was light, but it hid what he really wanted to say, what his instincts still told him to say and do. But he felt now that fussing over her, trying to support her, would be a mistake. He'd step in if she really needed it, of course, but he suspected that being allowed to feel somewhat in control was what had really helped Barbara, even if his expression of it to her had been less than ideal.

She gripped his arm tightly as she slid into the cab. "Let's go. To...the community centre." She said, with barely any hesitation. Her face was like death warmed up. The cab driver looked at her uneasily. By comparison to a normal person, she looked like she'd crawled out of her death-bed, and had a face that seemed to suggest she might keel over anytime soon.

"Are you sure she's ok to travel?" The cab driver asked him, ignoring her. She frowned.

"Just do it. I'm paying aren't I?" He snapped.

The cabbie shrugged, and pulled away. Patricia waved, her face torn between deep anxiety and a quite pride.

Barbara stared fixedly ahead, trying not to think about the people who should have been there to wave her off. She should have cried, perhaps, or felt sorrow for her mother's absence. Instead she focused hard on staying angry. She tried to conjure up every negative thought she could, to fuel that weak feeling. She remembered her self-defence training, the droning of her tutor. For a year now she'd been stuck in a Flight response.

It was time to Fight.


	3. Chapter Two, Anniversary without Tears

**Chapter 2**

The gala was everything Wills had expected, and was everything he knew Jim Gordon would have hated. High society types, swanning about in gowns and fine tuxedos, a tasteful orchestra playing classical music, a huge banner bearing Gordon's face draped above the podium, a wreath on a stand bearing the names of all the victims who had died during the Joker's Reign of Terror, most of them on that one Night. As if naming the community centre after him wasn't enough.

He held Barbara's arm protectively, like a father escorting his daughter to a debutante ball. The mental image amused him. Neither Jim nor Barbara would ever have been invited to this sort of high society function, much less been able to afford any sort of ball. He made a mental note to see if he couldn't take home some of the bottles of champagne that had been stacked around the place. He doubted he'd ever be able to afford vintages this fine on his regular salary.

"Stick close to me and just sm- well, just wave and nod politely at anyone who says hello." He whispered to Barbara. She nodded, her eyes roaming over the hall, taking in the decorations, the crystal ware, the waiters and the various people with a clinical disinterest. She simply noted each and every detail, and filed it away for later consideration.

Ray noted many familiar faces, both of friends and of the famous. Police Commissioner Akins was there in his dress blues, along with the DA and several Bureau Chiefs. Ray and the other MCU "heroes" were probably the only real policemen here, he thought acidly.

On the stage he saw a number of Gotham's more notable celebrities, including top businessmen like Oswald Cobblepot and Thomas Wayne. Wayne had particular reason for being here, Ray thought. Wayne and Gordon had maintained an odd friendship over the years, something Ray had never really been party to, but it was more than that. Barbara had been far from the only one taken on that Night of Terror, he knew. Wayne's son...he turned his gaze away from the stage. There were many sacrifices made.

He took a glass of something fizzy from a waiter's tray and downed it in one, the sickly cloying liquid curdling his taste buds.

"Ech. Why do the rich have to put bubbles in everything? A stout glass of whiskey is all a man really needs." He said with forced joviality. Barbara was technically too young to drink anything here, but he knew that no one would pay much attention if she helped herself to some champagne.

She declined the offer anyway. "I've had enough of clouding my mind." She said.

"Ray? Is this...Babs! It's been a long time! You look good!" Renee came up, looking wonderful in a dark purple cocktail dress. She threw her arms around the surprised girl, hugging her warmly. "I'm sorry I haven't visited. We should all visit Barbara more often, right Harv?" Renee tactfully avoided mentioning the change in Barbara's face, turning instead to try and get her own partner involved in the conversation. Harvey Bullock looked sour in a grey tuxedo that was straining around his waist. He nodded. "Yeah, sure." He seemed uncomfortable around so many of Gotham's well to do. His discomfort oddly made Barbara feel more at ease. At least he wasn't pretending to feel happy.

Barbara gave them a friendly nod, her eyes saying more than her face ever could. "It's...okay, really. Ray has been...helping me." She said, forcing herself to sound engaged. She knew exactly why they'd not visited much earlier. No one wanted to see a ghastly grin, a reminder of what their beloved chief had died to try to save. It was a bitter thought, and she knew it was probably unfair to direct her anger at two people who were just as good friends as Ray had ever been, even if they had been absent. But feeling angry gave her strength, and she felt that if she stopped now, it would be all too easy to fall back into the abyss.

Ray chuckled, though he hid quiet alarm at Renee's exuberance. He gave Harv a cryptic look full of meaning, and indicated Renee, an unspoken question passing between the two of them. _Has she been drinking again?_

Bullock shook his head, before picking up a plate full of finger food. "I'll see you guys around." He muttered, wandering off. Aside from the food and the booze, these sort of high society shindigs always made him feel uncomfortable. Babs didn't mind. Harv had never been one to say what he was feeling.

"I'm so glad to hear you're making progress. If you need any help, I can write a great letter of recommendation. There isn't a college in Gotham that won't take you if you want it."

Barbara looked at the older woman with some surprise. She hadn't once thought about college in an entire year. The idea of having a future was ...completely alien to her. That Montoya could suggest something like that and sincerely mean it caught her off-guard.

"Uh...thank you, Miss Montoya. I'll bear that in mind." She managed, her voice starting to fill with real emotion.

"Please, call me Renee." The woman beamed, before nonchalantly helping herself to a glass of champagne. "Ray, don't hover around her like a bat or something. I'm sure if Barbara needs you for anything she'll come find you, right?"

Ray felt alarmed. He was deeply afraid of leaving her alone, if she fainted or had a relapse or...he checked himself. Montoya was right. Barbara had plenty of friends here, even if she didn't know it. The Survivor of Gotham, the tabloids had called her months ago. More than any of the other survivors of that night, Barbara had...come to epitomise both the horror and the hope. For all that she'd been left scarred; Barbara at least had kept her mind and much of her health. There were several other girls and women who they'd pulled from the fire who had not been nearly so lucky.

"Babs?" He turned to her, and he could see from the look in her eyes that this was something she wanted. Maybe it was too soon, but they'd never find out if she could make it if they didn't try. He nodded respectfully.

"Alright. Montoya? You look like you wanted to dance." He grinned. They were co-workers and friends, and any flirtation between the two of them had only ever been, and could only ever be, playful, but now playful was what he needed.

Renee smiled. "You, dance, Ray? I thought you had two left feet." She led him off to the dance-floor anyway, but not before she'd downed her champagne glass and gotten another. He quirked an eyebrow at that, but declined to comment.

* * *

Barbara wandered alone, taking care not to over-exert herself, and gently nibbling at some snacks and drinking plenty of water. She, like Ray, was afraid of fainting. Already she'd done more walking and moving about in the last few hours than she'd done in months. After the night, she'd languished in hospital for weeks, her limbs too frail to move properly. She'd had to re-learn to walk, re-learn everything, all while trying to cope with the loss of a father and the seemingly irreparable damage to her face and mind.

She was leaning against one of the tables, catching her breath for a moment, watching the other young people chatting and dancing among themselves, a few casting glances her way and giggling, when someone most unexpected came up to her.

"Ah, Miss Gordon. A rare pleasure." Oswald Cobblepot, the local businessman and philanthropist, waddled up to her side, his grizzled face smiling at her. "Are you here alone? How typical of Gotham High society, to leave a rose of your calibre to wilt and fade, all for want of a few petals."

She regarded the misshapen man with suspicion, his obvious efforts to charm her sliding off of her like grease. She had certainly never expected this sort of attention coming here. Still, she welcomed it. It made the anger so much easier to maintain.

"Mr...Cobblepot is it? I'm sorry, I don't believe we've met before."

He extended his hand to her, bowing as he did so. "Indeed, you have the right of it, Miss Gordon. May I call you Barbara? I regret that we have not had chance to meet before. Your father and I were frequent...associates." His lips curled sardonically.

She took his hand without hesitation, keen to wrong-foot the unctuous man with a display of respect. She knew exactly why her father had visited this man so often, she thought to herself. He was almost certainly one of the leading figures in running the gambling circuits in Gotham City, and had his...fingers in many other pies, as well.

"If I may call you Oswald." She said, her anger making her daring.

Oswald blinked for a moment, before giving her a smile with genuine warmth. "Truly you are a rare flower...Barbara. I would be honoured to see more of you, if time permits. If you should ever find yourself in need of work, I would be happy to take you on as an intern or secretary. Cobblepot Incorporated has many avenues of employment, not just the entertainment sector. I distinctly recall you once aspiring to being a Librarian? I do hope that you have not let your love of books wane. Literature, I find, is a wonderful balm for the soul."

Barbara was quickly tiring of his company. For all his flowery words, he seemed to know rather more than was polite about her. She'd done some work experience as a Librarian before she'd been...taken by the Joker. Worse, his fawning manner made her skin crawl.

"Perhaps another time, Oswald. I'm sorry, but I'm feeling rather faint." She half-lied.

He nodded sympathetically. "I understand. Until next time, young Madame." He bowed with a flourish, and it took effort on her part not to run from him as fast as possible. She'd never met a slimier man, or one whose eyes had caressed her more greedily. In a way, she was grateful for the encounter. The rage she felt over this would easily sustain her for a few more hours.

Entering the women's bathroom, she threw some water on her face, letting the cool fluid sooth her cracked, bleached skin. She remembered the months of assisted bathing, Patricia making sure that she didn't pass out in the bath, or try anything foolish with a razor. She suddenly longed for a hot shower, all to herself, with no one waiting outside.

"Oh hey there, puddin'. You one of the girls?" A voice that sounded darkly familiar.

Barbara turned sharply, her heart thudding. Sure enough, another death-marked face was in the mirror, another person with a painful rictus grin and bleached blonde hair.

"Dr Quinnzel? I haven't seen you since..."

"The group therapy sessions? Sorry doll, can't pinpoint name to your face." The woman giggled. Another "survivor", it had been Quinnzel's lucky escape that had led Gordon and the Dark Knight to where Barbara and the other girls had been held. She supposed she should be grateful, or at least sympathetic to the strange woman's plight. Once a psychiatrist, she now, like Barbara, wore the scars of her encounter with Gotham's self-appointed "Clown Prince of Darkness". Unlike Barbara, Quinnzel seemed to also be a few cards short of a full deck.

"It's Gordon. Barbara Gordon."

"The chief's daughter? Ooooh, tonight must be very special for you then." The young woman swayed jauntily, clearly somewhat hyperactive. Barbara wondered where Quinnzel's minder had gotten to. Probably waiting outside, she figured. She knew the routine all too well.

"Special for all of us."

Quinnzel nodded. "Right. You're looking down though. No more smile? Heey, are you coming back to the therapy sessions? Arkham gets mighty dull you know. You and the other girl are the only ones of us who can even talk, you know. It gets sooo boring some-times. The rest are...catatonic...ahah...hah..."Quinnzel coughed back a laugh, and Barbara felt that maybe spending time with this woman wasn't such a good idea.

"Do you have your pills?" She asked with alarm. The bleached-blonde girl nodded, and quickly took a few, slamming them back with ease. "Aaah, happy pills to stop you being happy. Isn't that funny?" She giggled a little, before powdering her nose. Not that it needed powdering; the woman was already pale as death.

"I gotta go. See you around maybe? And visit us gals sometime!" The odd woman pranced off, seeming like a giddy schoolgirl.

Barbara looked at herself in the mirror for a few moments longer. There but for the grace of god...she thought. She was suddenly very glad for her anger. Yesterday the sight of the ex-psychiatrist would have sent her into a severe laughing fit.

Channelling her fury, pouring her hate at the world and society in general, she adjusted her dress and wig, and went back out there. If Quinnzel could do it, so could she.

* * *

After a few dances and some time chatting with various fine people all of whom seemed to regard Ray and Montoya as heroes, the right and left hand people of the great Jim Gordon. Wills sat down at his table, exhausted, nursing a cold bottle of beer he'd managed to scrounge from somewhere. He hadn't seen Barbara in a few hours, but she had seemed fine. It was hard to know if she was enjoying herself, and he'd kept a hawk-like eye out for anyone who tried to harass her, but most people seemed content to leave her alone.

Now as the evening wore on, the lights dimmed, and it was time for the speeches. He glanced across to where Barbara sat. Apparently she'd made a friend of sorts, another one of the "Survivors". Quinnzel, if his memory was correct. She was there with some bored orderly from Arkham. Apparently some well-meaning functionary in City Hall had wanted to have all the Survivors present, but aside from Quinnzel and Barbara, none of them were really...suited for polite company, and even Quinnzel seemed borderline to him.

There was a round of applause, and Ray turned his attention back to the stage. Mayor Hall had stepped up on the stage, looking grave and stentorian. The man knew that this was probably his last speaking occasion. The primaries were in a few weeks, and he knew that he was likely to lose out to one of the younger crowd. Judging by the man's haggard look, he could do with an early retirement. He wondered if the younger detectives thought the same about him.

"And now we come to the commemorative part of the evening. I want to start by thanking Thomas Wayne, Oswald Cobblepot, Oliver Queen and the good people at Prospero Incorporated for their tireless support of this city, and the donations which made this Community Centre possible. James Gordon made us all stronger, safer, and there isn't anyone I can think of worthier to remember in this way. Thank you, one and all."

There was another round of applause, and Ray observed the reactions of the people named. Oswald was basking in the praise as his just reward. Oliver looked bored, as if this was just another function of many he had to attend. Wayne...Wayne managed to look even older and more tired than the Mayor. A lifetime of horror lay behind Wayne's cold, glaring eyes. Even before the Joker, Thomas Wayne had been dealt a bad hand in life. Fifteen years ago, his wife and son had been victims in an abortive robbery. Martha had died, taking the bullets meant for her husband, and the boy, Bruce, had been left scarred for life, his face permanently ruined, his brain still containing fragments of the bullet.

That would have been tragedy enough, he felt, had the boy, becoming a man, not been sucked into the horror of the Joker's rampage. How much harder, he wondered, must it be for a Father to endure what he had endured? Barbara's struggle was great, he knew, but she had a whole lifetime ahead of her, and he had begun to feel hope that she might be able to make something of that lifetime.

For Thomas, there was nothing to look forward to anymore.

The Mayor continued his speech as the applause died down.

"Finally, I would like also to extend my deepest respect and sympathy to the Survivors. I know I speak for all Gotham when I say that we stand as one along side you. Your strength and courage inspire us all." He gestured towards Barbara Gordon and Quinnzel. Ray watched her with deep concern, ready to run forward if she seemed to be taking it ill.

Instead, she slowly managed her first normal smile, a dim, thin line next to Quinnzel's permanent grimace. He could see in her eyes a spark of anger so pure it chilled him. He'd seen that same spark when Jim Gordon had sworn to him he would kill the Joker.

The crowd applauded politely, but he knew their applause was muted. No one liked being reminded of the Joker's handiwork. The spotlight on the two young women quickly shifted back to the great and good of Gotham on the stage.

"And now, a moment of silence for the fallen. To Chief Gordon, taken from us in the line of duty, along with 17 of Gotham's finest, and 30 of her sons and daughters, forever innocent, their pain at an end."

The lights were dimmed, and the room bowed its head quietly. Barbara simply stared at the Mayor, willing him to die, her rage giving her strength, focusing entirely on this old pompous fool. Hating him was easy, she knew, and she took the easy path. The grief she felt would destroy her otherwise.

After the ceremony, she left Quinnzel with a polite nod. "I'll try to visit you sometime." She said non-committally. In truth, going to Arkham Asylum seemed like the worst possible thing she could do now. She had no wish to go anywhere near the place.

As she made her way back to where Wills was, she was intercepted by someone else, an old man with greying hair, bloodshot eyes and a wooden cane.

"Miss Gordon? Might I have a moment of your time?" He said gruffly. Unlike Cobblepot, this man made no pretences of nicety. He wanted something from her, but she doubted it was anything physical. The man seemed to be carved from stone.

"I'm sorry; I don't know your name." She said, turning to keep walking.

"Forgive me. I'm Thomas Wayne. I was a friend of your father. I need to speak with you. Alone."

"I'm sorry Mr Wayne, but it's been a very tiring evening, and I'm rather sick of meeting people who say they were a friend of my father. I'd like to go speak to –my- friend, Detective Wills. Thank you." She said, her anger spilling out into her voice in frustration.

For a moment Wayne looked at her like he was going to explode with rage. Then, suddenly, he burst into laughter, before coughing and choking. She looked concerned for a moment, but it seemed he was simply old. Laughter and choking were indelibly linked in her mind, and it was hard to remember sometimes that not everyone had...experienced what she had.

"No, it's me who should be sorry, Miss Gordon. It's been a long time since anyone has been so...honest with me." He allowed himself a thin smile. "However, I truly am a friend of Jim's. You can ask Detective Wills if you would like. But you are right, perhaps this isn't the right time." He began to write on a napkin, folded it, and forced it into her hand roughly.

"I'd like you to visit Wayne Manor. At your earliest convenience, if possible. We have...things we need to discuss. Your father and I had a very strong relationship, and there is a...legacy he'd want me to share with you."

The old industrialist wandered off, hobbling on his cane. She unfolded the napkin, and blinked at the words. Grey Ghost. Was this supposed to mean something to her? She yawned, the fatigue of a long and tiring evening suddenly catching up to her. She wondered if she and Wills would get the same cab back.

She looked back, briefly, at the fading evening gala, and at the huge picture of her Father. Anytime she had felt her anger flagging, she had simply glanced up at that picture. This whole city was rotten, she knew. This whole evening had been a mockery of everything that her father had stood for. She didn't know yet what she was going to do with anger, or with her life, but the novelty of having such control over herself, having such pure, untainted feelings, was something she appreciated.

Today she had made her first step away from the Abyss. Maybe she would never be truly free of the darkness, but she would be damned if she would ever have one of those laughing fits again. She gripped Wills by the arm tightly, pulling him with suprising strength.

"Is something wrong?"

"Come on, its time to go."

He nodded, no longer surprised by her new attitude. He glanced back at Montoya, giving her a sympathetic, sheepish grin. She simply smiled glassily back, clearly somewhat worse for wear. He saw Harv coming up, and he gave him a nod. _Make sure she makes it back home OK._

Another time, another place, Renee's growing drinking problem might have concerned him more. But for now, he was just relieved that one woman in his life at least was showing some signs of returning to Humanity.

"Let's go home. Will Patricia be up waiting for you?"

"No...well, maybe, yes. I told her to take the night off."

Wills chuckled. "That woman must really care about you."

Barbara simply sighed, too tired to make a rejoinder.

The old detective seemed to pick up on her mood. "Do you want to crash at my place for the night? I'll sleep on the sofa." He added hastily.

Barbara looked at him oddly, though she couldn't imagine any ill intent from the old gum shoe. "Patricia will pitch a fit...fine, why not. And I'll sleep on the couch. God knows what you do in your bed."

Wills looked flustered at that, and for the second time that night, she dared a ghost of a smile.


	4. Chapter Three, The Judge and The Oracle

**Chapter Three**

Throughout Gotham, the Anniversary was marked in other ways. For the Night Watch of the GCPD, the night saw eleven arson attacks, nineteen muggings, three murders and twenty-three domestic disturbances. Business as usual, as the crime spree continued. No juking of the stats could hide that Gotham had a problem, and it was getting worse.

For the Gotham Post, the night desk received no fewer than twelve letters, e-mails and video tapes that absolutely swore they were from the Joker, and that if they were not published they would resume their reign of unholy terror. The night desk unanimously decided to trash all of them, though the one that carried a severed ear got passed along to the GCPD for its consideration. For the veteran reporters, this sort of nonsense had become old hat by now.

For Prospero Incorporated, the night was also significant, albeit in another way. Their board of directors recieved subpoenas, as the ongoing investigation into what was still being treated as a significant industrial accident proceeded apace. They began to cast about for scapegoats, and braced themselves for the months of bad press and the likely significant fine they would receive for the oil slick disaster unfolding along the eastern coast. The Question Mark was receiving some traction in the tabloids, but for now no one could link it to anything but strange weather patterns or a quirk of nature.

For Wayne Enterprises, it represented another dip in their falling share prices, as rumours continued to circulate that Thomas Wayne was far past his prime, and that his son Bruce was in no condition to take the reins of leadership. Another rumour began to circulate that there would be a buyout, that Lexcorp or Queen Industries were looking to take over the ailing giant and increase their already significant domination in Gotham.

For Barbara Gordon, night faded into dawn as she slept peacefully on Wills's couch. It was the first dreamless sleep she had enjoyed in a long time, and despite the detective's own insomnia and worries, he couldn't help but envy her tranquil slumber. He paced aimlessly, going over the details of his current cases, before he was finally able to slide into sleep, exhausted.

For a boat full of fishermen, the slick was marking a death knell for decades of rich fishing. They tried vainly to assess the damage, noting how much of their haul was rotting and coated in thick crude oil. Then, by chance, just before they turned and headed for home and weeks of potential misery waiting for government handouts, they uncovered something.

Entangled in their nets was a human body, barely recognisable as a man, sodden from head to toe in oil and bloated from days of submersion. He wore no uniform and carried no identifiable papers or personal possessions. He was clearly no rig worker. Stuffed in his mouth was some soaked, barely legible paper. A mystery they would have to pass on to the coast guard, the fishermen knew. Another problem they really didn't need.

From the coast guard, a jurisdiction battle would begin. It would be some time before knowledge of this dispute would even reach the desk of a certain Gotham city detective...

* * *

Morning came, and it was now three days until Halloween. Gotham City was preparing for this holiday, as spooky themed decorations were strung everywhere in the suburbs, and the larger department stores put jack o lanterns and witch's brews in their windows. For the poorer parts of town, Halloween marked a steady upswing in petty crime, as bored kids and young adults helped themselves to whatever was foolishly left lying around, be it candy, lawn ornaments or even strings of lights, the copper wiring being worth something on the black market.

When Barbara awoke, Ray had already left for work, though he'd called Patricia and left an apologetic note for Barbara along with a reminder for her to take her medicine and to drink some of the coffee. Patricia would be along in half an hour it seemed. She rose from the couch, yawning. She felt strangely refreshed, despite the roughness of the sleeping condition. Maybe simply getting out of that house, full of memories, had been enough to break the pattern. Then again, she couldn't get too excited. Her face throbbed, her body still felt weak and fragile, and despite having drunk nothing alcoholic she felt like she had the worst hangover in the world, a throbbing headache and a powerful urge to vomit. Stumbling to the bathroom, she looked around the mess that constituted the home of the man who had been her only real foster parent for a year now.

Once she felt steadier, she drank plenty of water and took the pills that had become such a familiar ritual by now. It was probably far too early to decide if the laughing fits had left her for good, and she didn't want to take any chances. Going to the Gala had been a vital step for her, but doing so had left her completely exhausted. It would be a long time still, she felt, before she could approach the level of physical fitness she had previously enjoyed, if ever.

Ray's apartment was...almost depressing, in a way. It was clearly a place he simply slept and ate, from time to time. It didn't feel much like a place anyone would live in. There was no TV, no personal pictures, no decorations, and no personal effects. Just a bed, a couch, a kitchen-space, a tiny bathroom and box-shower, an overcrowded desk with an outdated Lextop personal computer plugged into a charger. If her house felt with memories of a previous life, Ray's place held no life at all.

Bored, and feeling incurably nosy, she looked around his desk, for signs of anything interesting. She fired up his Lextop, but wasn't surprised much to see it required a password. She could probably guess it or crack it with ease, but she had no reason to trespass on what was probably just a means for the old man to continue his work off-hours. There were books and scattered papers, as well as a few faded copies of the Gotham Post and the Daily Star. All of it seemed work-related. Even his copy of Shakespeare's _The Tempest _was simply a library book he'd rented to deal with this Prospero case.

Although she knew she probably shouldn't, she read through the case notes he'd left anyway. Once she'd held ambitions of following in her father's foot-steps. She still had no idea what she was going to do in the future, but frankly after spending a year cooped up with nothing but her thoughts and a nurse who wasn't overly chatty, her brain hungered for for something, anything else to do. Maybe she could help out in some way. She felt a pang of nostalgia, remembering the way her father had tested her wits and ability to recall details. She'd developed a photographic memory, able to recall trivial details that from time to time she'd been able to offer her father on his cases, helping him find answers that might otherwise have gone overlooked.

The Prospero Oil Spill was big news for Gotham city, and most of the material Ray had and which the media was reporting was treating it like an unexplained industrial accident, another example of greedy big oil companies skimping on safety measures. Ray had been working on finding a criminal link, and had delved into some fairly esoteric sources and material to try to assemble...something.

She looked at the Question Mark picture, which had become iconic. It seemed to signify something. A scientist's report, which she briefly skimmed through, confirmed it was unlikely to be chance.

"If this is the question, then what's the answer?" she mused aloud. She could see why it had gotten Ray's attention, and she sensed perhaps why he was so driven to investigate something that would usually have been far out of his jurisdiction or line of ability. She recalled how it had started, nearly two years ago, her father talking about a surge of...lunatics, odd cases. Masked villains and strange mutants. He'd also mentioned the Dark Knight, a figure he seemed to regard with...humour? Familiarity? Re-examining Ray's notes, she could see that he was looking for...something crazy. Some evidence that those strange times had returned.

Until now, she'd not really thought much about that. Her dark experience had completely consumed her, such that she struggled to remember a time in the past year when she hadn't been stuck reliving that night, or desperately trying to avoid thinking about it, which more often than not had meant she'd simply not...been thinking, at all.

Now she had Ray's case notes before her, and the obsession, no, desperation, that it betrayed, made her want to re-examine her past, and her father's past, as well. She'd never thought before, about the Dark Knight, or the Joker. The horror of what had occurred had blotted out everything else. But where had they come from? Were they unique, terrible things, or, as Ray seemed to assume, part of a trend that had occurred, stopped, and might re-occur again?

She awoke from her deep reverie by the sound of a heavy buzzer. Patricia was downstairs, and demanding to be let in. She didn't seem too happy. Barbara had the grace to at least feel somewhat embarrassed. Staying the night, even at a friend as trusted as Ray's, wasn't very good behaviour for someone in Barbara's condition.

She quickly tidied away the notes, having already memorised them. She would do more research later, perhaps. She had decided that feeling angry all the time was something she couldn't really support. Perhaps a good Mystery, something that could tax her brain, would both distract her and allow her to better regain control of her thoughts and memories. No longer would she let certain thoughts and ideas intrude on her consciousness, forcing her to see and feel things she really didn't want to. She would ignore the... Event, as best she could, and focus on something new.

As she went to let Patricia in, she was already plotting what she would do, and how she would go about investigating things.

Perhaps it was time to start being Oracle again.

* * *

Raymond Wills massaged his temples, still feeling a little hung-over from the night before. Montoya and Bullock had both elected to take the day off, and it seemed like most of the police department had chosen to do the same. He was part of a skeleton crew still keeping things ticking over. His leads into this Prospero case were going nowhere, and word had come down from on high that he was done with this investigation. The City was satisfied now, apparently, that there had been no outside criminal influence, and that the Oil Rig explosion was an industrial accident. FEMA and federal investigators would take over from here on in.

The frustrating thing was, he couldn't disagree with them. Based on what he'd been able to find out, he couldn't even put together a half-way legible conspiracy theory, let alone a plausible chain of events. The Question Mark, he was sure, signified –something-, but what? He'd even started digging around in Prospero's past. They had plenty of enemies, plenty of people who'd want to do this. None of them were claiming responsibility though, and even if they wanted to hide their direct involvement, a question mark was...well...a pretty ambiguous calling card, by its nature.

But now he was off the case. It seemed they were transferring the bulk of their resources to focusing on this rash of cop-killings. Word from on high was that if nothing else got solved this month, it would be these cases. A high murder rate, a high arson rate, and a high petty crime rate could all be fudged or overlooked. One need only look to Hub City to see how a modern American city could function even amidst a state of near-anarchy. But something that absolutely could not be overlooked or excused was a high attrition rate of law enforcement officers.

So, after reluctantly packing away all his official material on the Prospero case; he already had backups at home anyway- he started to sift through some of the material that Bullock had been working on.

Harv had been right. This was pretty ugly and violent stuff. He'd also established several surprisingly plausible theories that linked all the murders together. Although officially the cop-killing was simply opportunistic violence from criminals grown too cocky, Bullock felt convinced that they were all the work of one darkly gifted person. He'd named this theorised serial-killer the "Judge", a dark pun on the nature of the killings.

As Ray flipped through the forensics reports, he found his stomach churning. He hadn't seen violence this calculated, this methodical, since...well, since the Joker. But where that killing had been creative, intended to evoke some sort of dark parody of real humour, these killings were simply ruthlessly efficient, designed to kill their target as brutally and as quickly as possible, and leave the presumed assailant completely untraceable.

He noted one lead that sparked his curiosity. One of the victims had been Jim Corrigan, a junior detective who had worked the Joker case back in the day with them. He'd been transferred out at his own request after narrowly escaping an encounter with the madman, who'd killed Jim's then partner. There'd been some suspicion that Jim had been deliberately let go, and his story about how he'd escaped had always seemed somewhat off.

Another victim had been a famous defence attorney. Milton Delgue. He'd been the defence for many of the Joker's henchmen, and helped get them light sentences, arguing convincingly that many of them were victims of brainwashing, or just plain crazy.

Bullock was working on a theory that someone was trying to get revenge for the handling of the Joker case, but Ray was doubtful. Bullock was pretty notorious for his conspiracy theories, and had earned Ray's ire a few times with his private conviction that the Joker was still alive. It was bullshit, and he'd made it clear to Harv that if he ever spouted that crap to him again he'd knock him out cold. It...cheapened what they'd been through, somehow, to Ray's mind. Harv hadn't had to hold Barbara's hand through her laughing fits. He'd not been the one to dig Jim's burnt body out of the rubble. Such memories made his patience for conspiracy theories like that very thin indeed.

One lead that did intrigue Ray was one of the first cop-killings. The victim had been a beat-cop with a long history of drunkenness, who'd been on the force for twenty years, but had somehow never been discharged. There was no connection there to the Joker case, which had soured Harv, but something that had turned up in the autopsy had sparked his interest recently. The victim had been almost completely decapitated. Lodged in his bloodied throat, forensics had managed to find slivers of metal, which analysis had shown were a rare and potent alloy called Vibranium. Harv had looked at manufacturers, and there were only two in Gotham city. Wayne Enterprises and Prospero Incorporated.

Harv's curiosity about the oil rig suddenly made sense.

Assuming the murders were all linked, their killer had some sort of connection to one of those two companies.

Ray grinned. He knew how he'd be spending his afternoon. He was going to get into Prospero, and solve this mystery. Even if the cases weren't directly linked, what were the odds of two Lunatics running around Gotham city?

* * *

Barbara had endured Patricia's well-meaning lecture with stoicism, and even managed to give a somewhat convincing apology. Driving home, Barbara had braced herself for a return to a bleaker state of being. The thought of this person, through no ill intent of their own, confining her to a lesser state, had made her angry. She wasn't angry at Patricia, but the broken system for care that seemed to exist in Gotham.

She was angry too, that a girl of her age needed a minder. It was hard not to see the justification in some respects, but she knew now that she had found a purpose, something to turn her mind too, which could consume her as it had consumed Ray. She realised that she and the detective were more alike than she'd realised, and she wondered briefly what pain, what demons he was burying with his dogged approach to detective work.

After an hour, eating lunch and taking her pills and reassuring Patricia that yes, she was fine, Barbara had shut her bedroom door, and gotten to work. She closed the window, and shut the curtains, even though it was daylight. She'd spent far too long staring at the trees, at the sky, and getting lost within herself and her memories.

For the first time in a while, she fired up her old computer, inputting her password. She decided not to check her e-mail. She worried how much of it would be sympathy mail, or worse, hate-mail. She didn't need any of that now. She had a mission in mind.

She returned to a place she hadn't been in over a year. Hacker forums, communities of bored teenagers like her with brilliant minds and insatiable curiosity for classified information. She'd learnt a lot from such places, and had often snooped into the GCPD's most secure servers, taking care that she wasn't traced. It had been another way of getting a thrill, she realised. She'd been a bored, spoilt teenager, seeking thrills both intellectual and physical.

She logged on under her pseudonym, for the first time in a year. Oracle had been her handle, a pretentious name, but she'd been a cocky teenager, full of herself, convinced she knew everything. She browsed the forum, sinking back into her persona, old habits coming back to her as if she'd never been away.

She noted the usual topics. Pop cultural allusions, conspiracy theories, multi-media nonsense. She'd been absent for a year, and didn't much care such things, and didn't see catching up with that stuff as useful or helpful to her. She searched for stuff on the Question Mark, and fired up her instant chat client, waiting for it to download a year's worth of software patches. Tedious but necessary.

As she did so, she noted that much of Ray's work had already been pieced together by others, and theories were circulating about the Question Mark and what it meant. Some were, like Ray had tried to do, drawing on Prospero Inc as the victim, and cobbling together crazy theories that referenced _the Tempest._ Some had pointed out that the rig had exploded in a precise lull during the storm, and that the question mark-slick seemed to trail out towards remote islands that Prospero used for chemical research.

She filed away these facts for later analysis. On a whim, she decided to search the words "Grey Ghost."

She found an old TV show, dating back decades. Thomas Wayne would probably have been a boy at the time. A campy 1960s live action show, where a grey-clad noir hero and his boy sidekick had solved crimes and thwarted colourful villains. Disturbingly, the Grey Ghost had also sometimes been called a "Caped Crusader". She wondered if there were any links to the Dark Knight. A quick search found thousands of websites making that exact comparison, with some even drawing links to other vigilantes and...super heroes across the world.

She found a few, blurry photos of the Dark Knight, dating back to 2 years ago and to the weeks leading up to that...Night. There were some similarities. Grey and black colour motif. A Gas mask. A long cowl. A brimmed hat. The fedora in particular disturbed her. It looked like the hats Ray and her father had worn when out on duty, from time to time.

She checked, and found her chat client had finished updating. She quickly sent off some messages to her old friends, hoping her re-emergence after a year didn't too badly shock them. She hoped they were still around, at any rate.

Spoiler was the first to respond. She didn't know who Spoiler was, anymore than Spoiler knew who Oracle was. All she knew was that Spoiler was a fellow Gothamite, with similar passions.

_Spoiler92: hey_

_Oracle: hey there! Long time no see_

_Spoiler92: Thought you were dead_

_Oracle: No, just ill :/_

_Oracle: Sorry not been social_

_Spoiler92: S'ok. Been busy too lol_

_Oracle: You wouldn't happen to know anything about a Grey Ghost/Dark Knight connection would you?_

_Spoiler92: ...Who have you been talking to?_

_Oracle: Noone._

_Spoiler92: You're not Oracle. You're a fucking cop._

_Oracle: No_

_Oracle: What's up?_

_Spoiler92: Stay away._

_Spoiler92 Disconnected._

Barbara scratched her head, wondering what she'd said to upset her friend. She knew one thing for certain now, though.

She was definitely going to visit Wayne Manor.


	5. Chapter Four, A Night at Wayne Manor

**Chapter Four**

Raymond Wills barely noticed the arrival of Halloween. The rising and falling of the sun were distractions from his work, he knew. Three days. Three days he had spent exhaustively chasing down leads, trying to get information out of two of Gotham's largest and most secretive corporations. He'd barely seen his apartment, or had time to check in on Barbara. Even Harvey had started to get worried about how hard he had pushed himself.

"The department isn't going to foot the bill for all that overtime, Ray." Harv had said, in his characteristically blunt way. "Doesn't matter if you find Jack the Ripper. There's only so much overtime to go around."

"I'll work in my spare-time then." He had said gruffly, crumpling an empty coffee cup in his hands and throwing it behind himself into the trash can."You've really been slamming those Gold Blends back. Try not to give yourself a heart attack, Ray." Harv had warned one last time, before returning to his own work.

He ploughed on. He knew he was on to something here. He'd interviewed a dozen employees from Prospero, initially nervous because they thought he was still investigating the Oil Rig incident. He was, but he wasn't going to let them know that. They opened up a little when he made it clear he was officially there on an unrelated matter. The impression he got was of a company with a lot of ambition, a lot of enemies, and a lot of secrets to hide.

The Vibranium was used for industrial purposes, it turns out. An experimental material that was ideal for containing highly confidential and experimental chemicals and their waste products. As far as anyone he talked to knew, there was no way it could be used as a weapon, not by them. Prospero was thinking of entering the highly lucrative weapons market, and had bidden on DOD contracts. But this was all a matter of public record. Anything more than that, his interviewees had made clear, was strict NDA, and even a cop like him couldn't legally compel them to break those agreements without a special warrant.

Wayne Industries, if anything, was even more tight-lipped. Their loyalty to their ageing employer was commendable, he supposed. It was also frustrating. All he could find out was that Vibranium was definitely a material used, but in nothing that was commercially available. More than that, no one seemed to know, or be willing to share with him.

Frustrated, he'd even gone to the lengths of talking to industrial chemists, and had found out far more about the alloy than he had ever needed or wanted to know. It could be fashioned easily enough into a knife or weapon of that nature. It was light-weight, durable, extremely resistant to corrosion, and was wonderfully conducive to electricity. But using it as a knife would be like using a surgical laser to pick a scab. It was extreme overkill. If you wanted to kill someone, why not just use a regular knife?

Having thoroughly exhausted that lead, he returned to his desk, at first to check his notes, but gradually he realised he was thoroughly at a dead-end, and Harv hadn't passed on any more of his leads yet. He sighed with complete frustration, slamming the desk hard. Was he losing his edge? Two cases now in a week that he'd poured everything into, and gotten nothing out of. They weren't even obvious mysteries, just...random observations. Tantalising clues that screamed significance, but to what crime, for what purpose...

"Man you look like shit, Ray." Montoya dropped by, a wry grin on her face. She looked surprisingly peppy for the morning. He groaned. Was it still morning? Was it still October? He'd completely lost track of time.

She sniffed theatrically. "You smell like it too. When –was- the last time you had a shower? Or even went home?"

Despite himself, he felt a yawn coming on. Now that she pointed it out...

"I'm...fine...Just gimme a minute." He said wearily.

She looked at him with pity. "I've seen young bucks burn themselves out working their first cases plenty of times, but first time I've seen an old-hand like you try to drown yourself in the Midnight Oil. Did Harv give you the Corrigan case?" She said, sounding curious, but an odd note of anxiety in her voice.

"What? No. It's...god, now I try to put it into words, It all sounds so stupid."

"Try me." She swung round, plopping herself lightly into Bullock's empty chair, and scooting up beside Ray. "Have you even had a conversation with someone who wasn't a Person of Interest?"

"Yeah. I was just talking to Harv a few minutes- hours- yesterday morning." He frowned. Had it really been a whole day since Harv had talked to him? Where had that time gone?

"Whatever it is, it must be god-damn important, right?"

"Well..."

So he'd told her. It had been too long since he'd really just...sat and talked with a friend. He told her everything. Not just the Vibranium leads, or the Prospero Case and the damn question mark, but his worries for Barbara's future, his fear of failure. His fear that Jim's sacrifice might be for nothing, and that the Lunatics might be coming back, and this time there was no Dark Knight or _deus ex machina _coming to save them.

Renee had sat and listened politely, her own cares and troubles put aside for now while she helped her friend. By the end of it, Ray felt like he'd lifted a mountain, and was struggling to stay awake.

"You've always been the quiet one, Ray." Renee said when he'd finally finished. "Always just keeping busy. Even when Jim was around, you just did the work that needed doing, whilst everyone else went for the glory, or pranced about in the shadows. "He started to object, but she overruled him. "It's my turn. You're one of the best detectives I know, Ray. Not because you have the best informants, or know how to bend the rules, or always get your man come hell or high water, or any of that macho bullshit. You're a good detective because you care about the work. There isn't a nugget of information, no matter how small, that ever slips by you. There have been many a time over the years when I wished I had your focus, your dedication. " She leaned in close, her eyes locked with his.

"You're also going to kill yourself if you keep on like this. You need a break. You've been so wrapped up in the work, in caring for Babs, in anything but yourself. When was the last time you just sat down and enjoyed yourself?"

He couldn't answer her.

"You're not a machine, Ray. And you don't have any demons in your past. It's honestly kind of refreshing that your problem is that you're too much of a boy scout." She smiled, and there was tenderness there.

"Now I'm giving you a week off. A full week where you are to do nothing but enjoy some good food, watch TV, and play some video games or whatever. If I catch you anywhere near a Police station or doing any sort of field-work, I'll have Harv sit on you."

He started to chuckle, but the look on her face was dead serious.

He yawned, and could tell from her look that time-off was starting right now. "Ok, Ok. You've made your point, Renee. I'll turn in. Just make sure Harv gets my notes..."

"Don't worry about the case. I'll take care of it from here." He looked at her with concern. "But you're not in the MCU anymore-"

"Oh? I didn't tell you." She grinned, and showed him her new badge. "I've been promoted. I'm your boss now. MCU is mine."

He smiled. "Couldn't have happened to a nicer gal."

"Now get out of here. You need a full night's rest, and lay off the Booster Gold blends will ya?"

He bowed low. "Your wish is my command, Captain."

She quirked an eyebrow at that, but he hurried off before she followed up on her threat and called Harvey over to sit on him.

"One week, Detective! I'll have people check on you to make sure!"

He chuckled, and headed for home. If nothing else, maybe a good night's sleep could give him some new insights into the case.

Unread on his desk was a report from the Coast Guard, concerning a body with a strange note stuffed into its mouth recovered from near the Prospero Oil Rig...

* * *

Halloween had been a favourite holiday for Barbara as a child. For someone who had loved showing off and getting attention, dressing up in various costumes and winning candy by being charming had been almost too much fun. But, perhaps understandably, she now had a deep aversion to the mock "scary" aesthetic of Halloween, and Patricia was reluctant to let her leave the house alone on this night, especially so soon after the exhausting Anniversary Ball. It was almost kind of pathetic, but Patricia had a point. Even a six-year old wearing an evil clown mask could potentially give her a panic attack. It was something she'd have to work on, she knew, but right now she really didn't want to waste time with therapists or counselling sessions.

She had a mystery on the brain. She'd tried e-mailing Spoiler again but it seemed her friend was offline for the time being. She hoped the fellow hacker hadn't blocked her. What was so significant about the Dark Knight? She'd never paid much attention when she'd been younger, more interested in hearing about her father's exploits, for all that he sometimes mentioned having help from the vigilante. It was funny, she thought. For someone who had been so significant and so closely linked to her father and his work, her antipathy on the subject didn't really make a lot of sense.

She'd dug around more, and read up on everything she could about the vigilante, stretching back almost thirteen years. She found it strange that she'd heard almost nothing about him until three years ago, when the Joker had made his first appearance. Some people didn't even think it was the same Dark Knight, pointing out subtle differences in build and weight and height. Whoever he or they had been, everyone agreed that the Dark Knight had died that Night.

She could sense on the edge of her consciousness a dark shape, a memory that would intrude if she let it. She didn't feel ready to remember it, whatever it was. However the Dark Knight had died, whether she had witnessed it or not, what she could remember of the Joker's cruelty was more than enough for her surface thoughts to cope with now. She ignored that thread for now, and focused on the more distant past.

There'd been little else, beyond some conspiracy theories about where he had gotten his equipment, gadgets and vehicles. She noted that one of his trade-marks had been the use of non-lethal weapons, stun-grenades, knockout-gas and bolas to incapacitate and restrain criminals. Apparently in the weeks leading up to that...Night, the Dark Knight had abandoned such trademarks, and had simply overwhelmed the Joker's henchmen with sheer, bone-cracking force, crippling more than a few for life.

She wondered at that. She wasn't angry about it. In fact she kind of wished he'd taken more opportunities to kill the Joker. But the shift in tactics suggested that something about the Joker's many evil acts were taken personally by the costumed vigilante.

This still left the mystery of why Thomas Wayne had given her a napkin that seemed to cryptically point to the hero. She could be mistaken, of course. Maybe Wayne was senile, and simply wanted to talk about old TV shows with her. It didn't seem likely, however. Did Wayne know something about the Dark Knight?

Her intuition said yes. And if it had anything to do with her father...her breath caught. She wondered if it was wise to go poking around in this past, when she was still struggling to avoid her memories overwhelming her. But perhaps that was point. She only had the ending of the story. Perhaps the beginning and middle would...help her, somehow.

She was determined to at least try.

Getting permission to visit Wayne Manor had been exceptionally difficult. Patricia was still annoyed that she'd spent the night at Ray's. She seemed convinced that a girl like Barbara had no business being alone after dark with creepy old men. Her concern for Barbara's virtue was almost amusing. She couldn't imagine gentle Ray or elderly Thomas Wayne being able to threaten her in that way.

Finally, she'd managed to get a reluctant agreement, provided Patricia came with her, and that they both returned home before midnight. Barbara wasn't sure how long whatever Wayne wanted to discuss would take, but that had seemed reasonable enough.

She had barely been able to sleep that night, partly for excitement. It was hard not to smile, at least a little. After a year of being virtually housebound and insensate, getting to visit a place as...interesting as Wayne Manor made her almost giddy with anticipation. Even if she didn't find out anything about the Dark Knight, she was sure she'd get to see some interesting history. And, she was starting to get a little sick of Oatmeal. A rich man like Thomas Wayne was sure to serve refined cuisine. Maybe she could try a little, without getting sick or over stimulated?

Oatmeal really could get dull after a while.

* * *

Wayne Manor loomed ahead, a colonial castle that glowered over the hills above Gotham. The fading autumnal light gave it a suitably spooky air, and she wondered what the place would look like during a thunder-storm. It looked like somewhere a Vampire would live.

Patricia had looked nervous as they had driven up the driveway, buzzed in without comment after they'd spoken with the guard at the gate. Barbara admired the moodiness of the place, like someone had tried to bring an Edgar Allen Poe story to life, all faded clapboard and ivory-laced European marble fountains.

For Patricia it was a scary old house inhabited by a crazy old man. For Barbara it reminded her of another reason she had enjoyed Halloween so much as a child. She appreciated the power of stories, of creepy things that could be fun at the same time.

"Welcome to Wayne Manor, Miss Gordon." A crisply attired English butler greeted them as they pulled up by the front-steps. "My name is Alfred Pennyworth. Please call me Alfred. Allow our valet to park your car. I assure you it will be safe in Master Bruce's garage."

"Master Bruce?" Barbara had asked, surprised, as the butler and the other staff had expertly helped them out of the car and guided them up the steps. Patricia seemed awed by the fancy treatment, but Barbara's curiosity was fully piqued.

"Indeed. Master Wayne's son is also resident here with us." The butler seemed uncomfortable on the subject. "I do not believe Master Bruce will be dining with us tonight. It is unlikely you will meet him. Please do not worry about it."

The inside of the Manor was everything she had fantasized about, and more. Suits of armour, faded portraits, tapestries, busts of famous thinkers and great men, sweeping staircases...she was awed by the taste and refinement of the place. The Waynes must indeed be fabulously rich to afford and support a place like this. But she noted that there were few staff, and the place had a solemn, lonely air. Somehow, that only seemed to make the place more interesting to her. It was hard not to imagine all manner of gothic stories, of hunchbacks and secret laboratories and ghostly women... she stopped herself, remembering what she'd heard about Thomas's wife.

Alfred gave them a brief tour of the halls and various curios and artefacts within the Manor, and then given some time in the guest quarters to freshen themselves for supper. Patricia had made it clear they were not to stay the night, but seeing how plump and inviting the beds were, and how plush the furniture, it had been hard for even the stern nurse to say no.

As Barbara donned her evening dress, and applied her makeup and adjusted her wig in the bathroom, she noticed how...clean the bathtub was. Not just clean in a regularly polished sort of way, but a clean in a "never used" sort of way. She wondered how long it had been since anyone had regularly called on the Waynes.

Looking at herself in the full-length mirror, she could see that she really was starting to look more and more like she had used to. She was still painfully thin and scrawny, and her eyes were still sunken and her cheeks hollow. But liberal use of flesh-tones and thick foundation made her look...well, normal, almost. She adjusted her dress further. She was gaining a little weight, but not much. It would be a long time before she had the full, athletic figure she'd enjoyed a year ago.

Patricia had looked surprisingly fine in her own formal wear, her hair done up in a tight bun. It was the first time she had seen her carer look truly radiant.

"Welcome again to Wayne Manor. I'm Thomas Wayne. I assume Alfred has made your visit enjoyable so far?" A gruff voice greeted them as they entered the Dining Hall. It was grand, and clearly intended to host lavish banquets and dinner parties for thirty or more people. With just the three of them and the servants, the echoing silence and the glimmer of candles almost made them feel they were in a cathedral.

"It's been wonderful so far, Mr Wayne. Thank you for inviting us." Barbara seated herself awkwardly at the long table, a servant holding her chair back for her, laying out silverware. The gala had been fancy, but she was almost bewildered by the lavishness of it all. Patricia seemed equally lost, and couldn't help but feel somewhat out-of-place in such a setting.

Thomas Wayne had grinned, sitting silently and solemnly, all conversation muted and hesitant. He waited until they had awkwardly finished eating their soup and bread-rolls before finally bursting into laughter, making them both glance at him in concern.

"Ha-ha! Oh, I'm sorry ladies; you have to forgive an old, lonely man for indulging in some fun. Of course we're not going to eat alone in a Banquet Hall like this! Far too formal. Let's go up to the lounge, much cosier."

Patricia glowered at the old man, clearly embarrassed. Barbara simply allowed herself a thin smile. She was getting more confident in allowing herself such displays, no longer terrified that any smile would break her face into a rictus grin once more.

The lounge was a lot smaller, and more intimate, as Wayne had promised. The food served was also less bewildering, a simple, but well cooked 3-course meal. The conversation had been friendlier, but still polite and a little distant. Wayne had made some story about being a long-time friend of Jim's, and interested in perhaps offering Barbara an internship at Wayne Enterprises, or even funding a scholarship at a University of her choice.

Patricia had gasped and been suitably impressed, but the young detective's daughter was not so easily fooled. Whatever the old industrialist had invited her here to discuss, talk of a bright academic future was not it.

She still found the idea of such offers and talk alien and distant. Whilst Patricia talked about Barbara needing just a little more time to recover, find her feet, and perhaps needing allowances, Barbara's own thoughts were still firmly centred in the present. She could no more plan her future than she could face her recent past. All that mattered was finding answers to her new focus, a new purpose.

After the dinner was over, Alfred had skilfully offered to gift Patricia some wine from the cellars, and had led her off to show her around some more. Barbara gave the butler a nod, indicating she understood and was grateful. The English butler's eyes had simply twinkled back at her.

"Now we're alone, Miss Gordon, perhaps we should get to the heart of the matter. Do you understand why I have called you here?" Wayne asked, leaning back in his chair, steepling his fingers as he regarded her appraisingly.

"Of course. You want to talk about the Dark Knight. Something to do with my father." She leaned forward conspiratorially.

"Are you the Dark Knight, Mr Wayne?"

He looked at her, surprised for a moment. Seeing the look in her eye, he grinned. "Revenge for my little joke earlier, eh? No, you are only half right."

He got up, and turned the lock on the lounge door handle, making sure they were alone.

"Perhaps I've gotten careless in my old age. What makes you think I'm the Dark Knight?"

"Grey Ghost? I doubt my father was much of a fan of those old serials, even if he remembered them or their re-runs. I also don't see what a television show neither of us has watched would have to do with me, or a...legacy." Her heart quickened, wondering if her blind-firing really was hitting targets.

He looked at her quietly for a moment.

"No, you're just guessing. You don't really know anything do you, miss Gordon?"

She blushed, feeling awkward. Well, now she did feel a damn fool.

Somewhere, an old-fashioned grandfather clock began to chime.

Thomas Wayne looked at her with an emotionless face. In a quiet, serious tone, he spoke to her.

"I'm not the Dark Knight. Jim Gordon was. And I'd like you to take his place."


	6. Chapter Five, A Winter's Tale

**Chapter Five**

Lieutenant Rebecca Mulcahey hurried nervously along Crime Alley, her coat lapels turned up to hide her face. It was a cold, wintry night, and she'd received a tip from one of her anonymous sources. It was time to go to ground.

As she hurried along to the agreed upon safe house, she wondered how she'd been rumbled. That idiot Corrigan? No, he was dead. She sighed, hugging her coat closer to her, her eyes scanning the desolate back streets nervously. Something must have come up.

She noted the sign of the Black Masque. She was almost there. An exclusive night-club, it was where she was to go when she received the signal. Just a few more yards and she'd be safe. No one could touch her there. Not even the GCPD would dare cross the club's infamous owner.

Suddenly, there was a noise. Mulcahey yelped, despite herself, spinning around. Seeing nothing, she began to relax. A cat maybe? This part of Gotham was notoriously seedy. Something tickled at the back of her mind, but she squashed it.

As she came up to the door, readying her ID for admittance, she allowed herself to slow down, relaxing more. She cast her mind back, several years, to the fateful arrangement that had put her in this place to begin with. It was all that asshole Jim's fault, she knew. If she hadn't walked in on him receiving orders from one of the Mask's top enforcers, she'd never have ended up in this mess.

Though, she thought with a cruel smile, the perks of the position had more than made up for the inconvenience. Well, at least until the Joker came.

As she stepped up, showing her ID with trembling fingers to the trench coated bouncer, she shivered. It was getting colder, she knew. Snow, perhaps? She looked up at the sky, seeing the grey clouds approaching. It would probably be a long, cold winter this year.

Suddenly she felt something cold and hard wrap around her outstretched arm, making a loud metallic snap. She yelped, and looked back at the bouncer. Only it wasn't a bouncer, or even a he.

In front of her was a woman with a blank face, no eyes, no nose, no mouth, just flesh. The strange figure wore a fedora and a navy blue trench coat, black hair tied back along the faceless woman's neck. Though she had no visible eyes, Rebecca could tell that she was looking right at her. A pair of hand-cuffs now linked them together.

Rebecca screamed.

"Shut up. I'm taking you in, Mulcahey." A familiar voice said.

"You can't do that! Don't you know who I work for? Whose club you're standing in front of? He has friends! Powerful friends! No one in the GCPD can touch him!" She babbled, fear gripping her heart.

The faceless woman looked at her, and somehow Rebecca knew that the figure was smiling.

"I didn't say I was arresting you, Mulcahey. Now be quiet. You'll find out its me who...asks the questions around here." The figure's voice was full of maniac glee.

"You're coming with me, and you're going to answer for what you and Corrigan did to fuck us over."

Mulcahey began to object, but suddenly felt a chloroform rag being pressed against her mouth. As she faded into unconsciousness, she wondered where she had heard that voice before...

The Question worked swiftly, loading the knocked out renegade cop into the back of a rented u-haul van. She glanced briefly up at the club. Five minutes earlier, she'd arranged for a huge ruckus to occur inside, calling all the real bouncers away. She'd effortlessly taken over, and shooed all the other visitors away until Mulcahey arrived. The Question grinned to herself. Finally, she had the means to get the answers she wanted. And, if they weren't the ones she wanted to hear, she'd get Revenge.

The van sped away, into the cold night.

* * *

The grandfather clock continued its slow tick in the fading silence.

Barbara's heart thumped, filling her ears with a thundering counterpoint.

_Tick._

_Boom._

_Tock._

_Boom._

_Tick._

_Boom._

_Tock._

Thomas Wayne simply watched her impassively, his hollow, steely eyes boring into her, waiting for her to react.

She swallowed, and her brain began to reboot. Wildly firing neurons bypassed the obvious, and shoved a strangely astute observation into her mouth before she could override it with common sense.

"That's impossible. He and the Dark Knight were seen together multiple times."

Thomas Wayne allowed himself another tight-lipped smile, as sweat beaded on Barbara's brow. She felt herself paralysed with shock. She was frightened that she was going to burst into laughter, and never stop.

_This has to be a dream. A messed up, crazy dream._

"Very perceptive of you, Miss Gordon. But what I said is true. James Gordon was the Dark Knight. I did not say that the Dark Knight was only one man."

Now Barbara was really confused. "Wait, what?"

Thomas leaned back into his chair, sighing wearily. "It's very simple, miss Gordon. The Dark Knight wears a mask does he not? A champion of the people. He could be many people. Dozens even, and no one would much know the difference. How else would anyone know?"

Barbara struggled to grasp the enormity of what she was being told. It was...she frowned, a spark randomly bouncing in her head. It –was- bullshit.

"No. You don't have an army of Dark Knights. At most there could only ever have been two." She said with sudden clarity and conviction.

"Oh? What makes you say that?"

"Many reasons. But the simplest is that I wouldn't be here if you could recruit anyone. The other Dark Knight is Bruce Wayne, isn't it?" She said, once again firing into the blackness.

A slight twitch of Thomas's eye. She grinned fully, so hard it almost hurt, and she stopped. She hadn't felt this happy since...well, since before her father had died.

"A lucky guess." He allowed. "Alas, my son is no longer...fit to be the Dark Knight. And until recently, neither were you. James made me promise not to make you aware of our little endeavour without his permission, or before you were sixteen. You turned sixteen several months ago, but I judged you were not fit for conversation at that time. I was going to wait till you were eighteen before making a final decision on whether you would ever be ready, but seeing you at the Anniversary..."

Thomas sighed. "You looked half-dead, Miss Gordon. I don't mean to offend you, and you did look perfectly lovely, but anyone could see you were holding on to life by the fingernails."

Barbara felt her soul be ripped out, her excitement rapidly leaving her. She felt the abyss yawning beneath her again, and she looked deep into Wayne's aged eyes.

"Nonetheless..." he continued. "You are the daughter of James Gordon. The fire in your eyes convinced me. If nothing else, you deserve to know the truth."

She let out a deep sigh, and wondered why she had been so crushed. She hadn't come here expecting anything like this, or even wanting anything but the truth in the first place. So why did her pulse quicken, her mind race, her stomach flutter at the idea starting to bloom within her?

Was it really that simple? Could her months of agony, anger, despair. Was it really so easy to plant such a strange seed of hope within her?

After everything she'd been through, could Thomas Wayne really take away all that with a simple, surprising, amazing proposition?

She had no time to think, to begin to examine this new, incredibly reality.

Thomas Wayne began to speak, and as the clock continued to tick and the old-lights flickered, a wind began to rattle the windows from outside. The atmosphere really was perfect.

"Seventeen years ago, just before you were born, a crime happened. It was a simple mugging, a desperate thug with a revolver and more hate than sense. Three victims, one over bold with youth, rushed forward to bite the thugs arm. The revolver went off, three times. It killed one of the victims, and wounded the boy in his head and his heart. The third victim stood frozen in anguish." Thomas's voice was cold and sepulchral.

"Such a crime would have passed unnoticed, no doubt. A thousand stories like it are told every-day, in Gotham City alone. But the survivor of the senseless attack was no ordinary victim. He was a billionaire, with all the world's wealth and resources. His rage and grief were terrible to behold. He wanted to save them both, but it was already too late. So great was his guilt, he turned away from the other survivor, unable to face the living, constant reminder of his failure."

Thomas cleared his throat, his eyes staring straight ahead, no longer seeing Barbara, but seeing through her, to a distant point.

"He did not know how to heal, how to adapt. Others would have let such a storm roll over them, accepted their losses, and moved on. But the billionaire believed himself special, above all others, better than God. If he could not bring her back, he would see those who took her from him burn."

He paused, and turned away, closing his eyes for a moment. He shed no tears. He continued after a few seconds, in the same deadpan tone as before.

"Then there came an Angel, of sorts. Another survivor who raged at the world. His first partner; murdered in front of him as a warning. The thug responsible both times had been more than a grunt; he was a rising force in Gotham's pre-eminent crime syndicate of the time. Both the billionaire and the newcomer hated this syndicate, the Falcones. They wanted justice, they wanted revenge, but neither of them alone could get it."

"So they came together, and forged an insane plan. It wasn't enough merely to find and kill the thug, to avenge the death of their...partners. They hated the evil that had birthed the thug, and they swore to take what measures they could to eradicate such evil from the city they loved."

Barbara breathed, enraptured by the tale, finding it surreal and distant, like a fairytale. Yet she knew these events were deeply pertinent to her in the here and now. A thousand questions were born and died in her mind. She did not want to interrupt the old man, who had her spellbound.

"We swore that we would never sink to the same level. That our revenge would be pure, and tempered with justice. That we would never use guns, never kill, nor allow others to come to harm by our inaction." Thomas shifted tenses with ease, the flow of the story barely affected. Perhaps this part of the story was easier for him to tell as himself.

"We decided on the mantle and moniker of the Grey Ghost, a series that inspired me as a child. It was Jim who suggested the additions of the gas mask and the armour. He knew how dangerous the streets could be. He also knew that criminals are a cowardly and superstitious lot, and that Fear would be our most potent weapon of all."

He offered her a drink. Barbara barely noticed, and swallowed the glass of water in one long gulp, her eyes fixated on the old man, eager for him to continue.

"It was hard, to begin with. I tried donning the mantle myself, in the early days, but I lacked the skill, the temperament. I would don it again later, but by then the reputation had been established, and I needed only serve as a quiet guardian, the threat of swift and terrible justice.

Your father was always the true Dark Knight. In the early days and beyond, he had the determination, the skill, and the power to make an impact. By day he worked relentlessly on uncovering leads, his network of friends and informants within the GCPD growing. By night he pounded the streets, attacking and eliminating the most vile and public crimes first, but gradually working his way inwards, burrowing into the nests of iniquity, seeking out and destroying their queens.

But I think...I think it took its toll on him. He grew tired of the war, of the endless sea of filth. He...missed you, and his wife, and then his second wife. He hung up his cowl for good when you turned nine, and by that time there was someone else who could patrol the night in his place.

My son, Bruce Wayne. It is...not my place to speak of him, or his part in the tale. Suffice to say, he never truly replaced your father in the role, not in my eyes."

Barbara felt her senses reeling; memories long repressed or buried suddenly surfacing with a fury. Everything began to make sense now. Things she'd ignored or overlooked. Things that a child takes for granted. She had always assumed her father was simply a tireless detective. She could never have imagined that his crime-fighting would well...involve so much actual fighting.

She remembered her ninth birthday. Her father had been there. She realised with shock that had been the first time he had been present at a birthday or special event that she could remember. She searched in vain, but in all earlier memories her father had only ever been there in the dawn or the latest evening. She remembered the fedora, the reinforced metal brim, which he had brought home for her one time, a curiosity he had called it. She remembered finding strange balls in his jacket-pocket, and realising now they were gas grenades. The angry shouting that made up so much of her father and mother's and stepmother's time suddenly made much more sense.

He wasn't just an overworked, job-obsessed detective. He was one who worked beyond the law, though never above it, to ensure justice was done.

"What...What happened next?" She asked shakily, a dread certainty creeping up on her, but unable to avoid the trajectory of the tale, incapable of ending the story before it had finished.

Thomas looked at her with real sorrow in his eyes. The tears he had not been able to shed over his own tragedy, he now seemed able- or willing- to show for her own.

"The Joker happened." He paused, gauging whether he should continue. Finally, reluctantly, he did so.

"We...I...still don't know where he came from, or who he really was. Nearest I can tell, the syndicates were sick and tired of being squeezed. They'd been all but decimated, and all their regular contacts were terrified of the Caped Crusader. Every hit man they had hired either refused to follow through or failed utterly. They'd done everything they could, infiltrated the GCPD, broken out hundreds of convicts from Stonegate, anything and everything to ruin and destroy and demoralise the Dark Knight.

But then as if from nowhere, the clown came. I don't think they could have fully realised what they were doing. They opened Pandora's Box. They gave the clown everything he asked for, money, men, weapons, access to materials and contacts forged over a lifetime. An entire city's criminal underworld came together, united in their fear of the Grey Ghost.

To fight Order, they had unleashed pure madness."

Wayne shuddered. "It must be...it must be going to snow soon. Damn November." He muttered unconvincingly.

"I...won't pain you more. God knows you probably know what the Joker was like better than I do. Suffice to say, my son proved insufficient to the task. Though your stepmother begged him not to, your father donned the cowl again."

Thomas's face hardened.

"Someone betrayed your father, and you. I don't know who. Chances are the Joker killed them too when he was finished with them. But someone gave up your father's identity to the Joker, and he in turn hijacked that school bus with you on it. Your father...came closer that day to breaking our vow that day than any when else. For all I know, he did break it in the end. Though I have no right to say this, I hope he sent that monster screaming back to hell."

Barbara sat there, unmoving. She clenched the arm-rests of her chair with such determination she felt like her fingers were going to bleed. Her arms were locked tight, her muscles straining. Her whole jaw was on fire, and her eyes watered. She managed to incline her head towards her purse by the floor.

Seeing the look on her face, Thomas broke out of his reverie with alarm. He rushed to the bag, and fished out the bottle of pills, forcing several down her mouth with a chaser of water. She shuddered as the pills rumbled down her throat, and after several minutes, her muscles began to relax, and the tension flowed out of her.

"Are you all right, Barbara? Forgive me, I got carried away." He seemed genuinely apologetic. The sight of this cold, stern man apologising to her helped calm her greatly. It was...an odd sight, and genuinely amusing.

She nodded, her eyes crinkling with warmth, though she still did not feel it was safe to smile again so soon.

"I'm...sorry. I thought I was...stronger." She croaked hoarsely. "Please...don't apologise. I'm...I'm glad you told me. "

Wayne smiled, and was about to say more when there was a rap on the door. Patricia had returned, Alfred behind her, looking distinctly ruffled.

"Sorry I was away so long, dear. How was your chat with Mr. Wayne?" She looked at Barbara with intent concern.

Barbara looked up at her wearily, returning to her exhausted, automatic state. But the seed of fire within her still burned, despite her brush with the abyss. What she had heard only fuelled her new purpose even stronger.

"Thank you for talking with me for so long, Mr. Wayne. I'll talk to you about...the University you wanted me to go to again soon." She quickly lied.

Thomas nodded, responding in kind with perfect smoothness. "A pleasure as always, Miss Gordon. Take your time. You need to be strong in body and mind if you want to attend that University someday." He said with a twinkle in his eye.

As they headed back to the car and the long drive home, Alfred trying in vain to persuade them to stay the night. But Patricia was determined. Although she seemed to have quickly grown fond of the old English butler, she had a charge in her care, and would not be swayed from her duty. Though, she had agreed to take home several exquisite bottles of Chardonnay as a gift from the Wayne's cellar.

Barbara wandered about in the cold night air, looking up at the full moon, her breath now coming out in visible puffs. Rubbing her arms to keep warm, she noticed a single, lone bat flying across the moon's shadow.

A vampire coming home to roost? She smiled inwardly at the mental image. It had been a surreal evening, full of gothic ambience and an extraordinary story. And it seemed the story was not quite over.

For the first time since she had been a child, she knew with absolute clarity what she wanted to do with her life, now.

She would become the Dark Knight.


	7. Chapter Six, Spinning your Wheels

**In memory of Bob Hastings, original voice of Commissioner Gordon in Warner Brother's Batman: the Animated Series. A great actor, a great voice, who died today at the age of 89. He will be remembered.  
**

**Chapter Six**

Rebecca awoke in a cold, dark place. Her eyes had been covered by a blindfold, and as she squirmed she realised her wrists and ankles had been bound. She breathed out unsteadily, uncertain. She remembered, and grew afraid. She had been abducted, probably by a vigilante of some kind, one who seemed to have no face.

She shuddered, the terror and uncertainty of her situation hitting her. She'd told no one where she'd been headed, or what she was doing. She was alone. It could be hours or longer before anyone thought to check on her, days before a missing person report. She knew exactly how slow and corrupt the GCPD was even in matters like this. She'd helped fudge such investigations in the past herself, taking her cut when the Black Mask needed the police to look the other way when he disappeared someone.

Now it had happened to her. Panic gripped her heart, as a thousand terrible scenarios played out in her head.

She struggled frantically at her bonds, squirming about on a cold, hard floor. Stone, of some kind. She could hear a drip-drip noise from somewhere, and feel the wind. She was outside somewhere? Near running water?

As she struggled, she heard the sound of booted feet approaching. She froze, her heart hammering, waiting, unable to see what was coming next.

Pain exploded in her side, a steel-toed boot slamming into her kidneys. She coughed, retching on to the stone floor beside her, her whole body quivering in pain.

"Awake yet? Good. We're just getting started." A cold, pitiless feminine voice spoke.

"Please! I'm an officer of the law; you've made a mistake-"Rebecca tried, babbling incoherently. Another swift kick silenced her.

"Shut up. You will respond only when spoken to. You will answer my questions, concisely and truthfully. Do this and I might let you go."

Rebecca shuddered, and waited, the stench of her own vomit assailing her nostrils, her whole body throbbing with pain, her wrists and ankles chafed by their bonds.

"My first question. When did you first start working for the Black Mask?"

"I don't know what you're talking-" Another boot, this time stamping down on her foot with force, pain shooting up through her, cutting her off with a howl of pain.

"Start co-operating. Or do you need more of an incentive?" Before Mulcahey could think to respond, an engine started, somewhere in the darkness. A loud, throaty roar, probably belonging to a large truck.

"My friend there needs to back his truck up into this loading bay. Every time you lie or evade one of my questions, I'm going to let him drive back another few inches. You don't have any idea how far away it is, or how many chances you might get. So co-operate, or you're road-kill."

Rebecca sobbed, terrified, as she heard the truck rumbling in the distance. "Please, I swear, I'll never do anything bad again-"

"Back her up buddy!" the questioner yelled. There was a roar, and the sound of tires crunching gravel, the tell-tale beep-beep of a truck reversing slamming into the captive's ears.

"Ah! I started working for him three years ago! It was Jim Corrigan! I swear!" She yelled out, and felt great relief when the truck's noise stopped, dying down to a low, constant rumble.

"Good. But none of the bullshit. Just answer my questions. How many cops did you pass on? How much did he know about the Major Crimes Unit?"

"What? No, we didn't do anything like th-"The truck roared into life, and Rebecca quickly shouted "All of it! The current rosters, names! He wanted to know everyone! Their weak-points, everything!"

"Just as I thought. You were their weasel weren't you? What did they buy you with, mm? Was it drugs? Money? Power?"

The truck rumbled on, and its noise was becoming deafening. Rebecca shouted as loudly as she could, feeling blind panic.

"No! No! Nothing like that! Stop the truck! Please! I was...I was Jim's girlfriend, OK? He was already with the Black Mask! I had to work for them or they'd kill me, I swear!" She sobbed, fear of death overriding everything.

"I see. Last question. You better hurry up, it's almost here. Who else reported to the Black Mask?"

The trucks' rumbling was surely no more than a few inches from her head. She could hear the sound of tires crunching down, and could feel the heat of exhaust fumes creeping on to her face.

"Ah! No one, I swear I swear! Jim and I were the only ones who knew the MCU! He, he had others working the other units! God, no stop!" She screamed, as she suddenly felt the slight brush of tire rubber against her hair, and she convulsed with pure terror.

The noise stopped completely, the truck's engine turned off.

"That'll do for now. But I'll be watching you Rebecca. Don't even think of leaving Gotham City. You're resigning from the police force tomorrow. You tell anyone about what happened, you try to complain or hide anything in any way, I will find you, and I –will- squash you, like the cockroach you are."

The figure hoisted her up with a strong grip, hauling her and walking steadily. She felt herself thrown roughly into the back of the truck.

"Good night, Mulcahey. Pray you never have to answer my questions again."

She felt hands reaching down, a cloth covering her mouth, and then darkness.

The Question looked back over her handiwork. The truck had been reversing into the bay next to where she'd put Mulcahey. A simple hairdryer to simulate exhaust-fumes and a spare tire had been more than enough to convince the cowardly lieutenant of the danger. The Question sighed to herself. She'd never be comfortable with shenanigans like this. And she knew that somewhere, out there, someone was going even further, killing Jim and everyone who was corrupt in Gotham's justice system.

She didn't know who it was, how they were getting their information. But she was determined to find what she knew was the source. She was in a race, she knew. She was going to get the son of a bitch who sold out Jim Gordon, and she was going to see they paid, the right way.

She nodded to her friend and accomplice, a homeless man she'd paid to simply reverse the truck at her signal. She gave him a fifty bill, and told him to scram, while she fired it up. She was going to dump Mulcahey on the outskirts of town. Let her walk back in shame. She'd rather throw her in the slammer, and she absolutely should have turned this woman over to the police.

But she also needed to find this...this "Judge" that Harvey Bullock had identified. She wasn't just watching Mulcahey to make sure she'd gotten everything on the Black Mask. She was watching to see what this other vigilante would do.

And if he killed Mulcahey, she would find him, and finally get the answer to her Question.

* * *

Thomas Wayne sat up long into the night, a glass of bourbon, its ice long-melted, resting on the table in front of him. He stared out into the darkness, watching the wind whip the long, skeletal branches of the trees on his estate, and the way the full moon's light bathed the gardens in a ghostly ambience.

The grandfather clock continued to tick, and he barely turned around when he heard someone enter the room behind him.

"You're late. Again."

"I'm sorry, father. Business as usual..." A sad, but polite voice, masculine and firm, but tinged with uncertainty.

The old man sighed, and slowly turned to face his son. The painful scars that dominated the young man's face, the lidless and red right eye, all of this had long since ceased to shock or disgust him. But it was always what he looked at first, a constant reminder of how he had failed his wife and son, a single moment of fear ruining two lifetimes and ending a third.

"Wayne Enterprises can survive a few hours without you, Bruce. You needn't push yourself so hard at the office." Thomas said, kindly. He knew this was a half-truth. He knew where Bruce had most likely really been, what he had done.

Bruce's left face twitched, half-smiling, the most he could do. He sat down where Barbara had sat a few hours earlier; putting aside a brown leather suit-case he had carried.

"Yes, thank you father. Did...did you see Barbara today? Alfred told me about a rather indomitable woman he met today, which was suprising. I didn't think he 'd find anyone to feel that much affection for again."

Thomas grinned. "I don't think the woman Alfred was talking about was young Barbara, Bruce. Her nurse maybe...But Pennyworth's personal life is none of our business, Bruce, even if we do have rather too much sentiment for the old fool."

Bruce nodded. "I see you're evading my question, father."

"It's none of your concern."

Bruce's eyes lit up, and he curled his left lip. "The hell it isn't. I know exactly what you are thinking, dad. How can...how can you think she is ready?" His words were hot, but full of obvious concern.

"I don't. The girl may never be ready..." There was an unmistakable disappointment in his voice.

Bruce softened, picking up on his father's mood. "You...want her to be ready, don't you? You...even after all this time, you still think a Gordon can do it better." There was no bitterness in Bruce's voice, only a deep regret.

"Bruce..."

"No...I'm sorry. It's me who's let you down, father. I...I know I can never be the Dark Knight you want."

The old man reached forward, hugging his son without hesitation. "You have never let me down, son. I'm sorry; its me who has been unworthy of you."

They broke the hug awkwardly, and Bruce poured himself bourbon steadily. "Let's...let's drink, father. Like old times."

Thomas smiled. "I'd like that. To the future." He raised his glass.

"To forgetting old ghosts." Bruce responded, and they drank together, and sat in silence for a few moments, before turning the conversation to more trivial matters.

Deep within himself, Bruce Wayne had come to a resolution. His father clearly still saw his old friend in the young woman, Barbara. He wanted his father to feel happy, and having a Dark Knight again, a Gordon to patrol the streets, would make him feel that comfort again. He would please his father, whatever it took.

The scarred part of his face twitched, smiling in unison with his unmarred left-face. If Barbara wasn't ready, they would _make_ her ready.

* * *

Barbara yawned, awakening in her bed, rolling over and looking at the time. It was already nearly eleven. She groaned, burying her face in the pillow. Another morning lost to fatigue. Once she'd been content to simply sleep her days, weeks, months away, each day blurring into the next. She could scarcely remember a time when she'd actually done anything meaningful with her time.

She struggled to rise from her bed, and all her excitement and energy about her meeting with Wayne had melted away. She was still stuck with a body that experienced near chronic agony. She sank back into the pillows, tears of frustration spilling from her eyes. Her limbs felt leaden. How had she fooled herself for even a few days into thinking she could really move past this.

She cried, the abyss overtaking her. A black mood fell across her like a pall. Even when Patricia came to help her up, she was reluctant, sour, and inward looking, her tone once again dead-pan.

How could she ever hope to amount to anything, experience any sort of life, normal or otherwise? She'd not spoken to real human beings about normal things in months. Even without her permanent grin, she was still impaired, exhaustion even after a full night's sleep making it impossible for her to rise from her bed without help. Another shower where a woman had to help her stand, help her hold on to a rail while hot, scalding water washed away dirt and make-up alike.

She was always afraid to look at herself in the mirror after the shower. Afraid of what she'd see. A corpse with wriggling red-worms for hair on her gaunt and shrivelled skull. Her black circled-eyes, their once bright blue irises now a murky and faded colour. Her sunken chest, exposed ribs, scarred, pallid, maggot-like skin. Her small, flabby breasts. Everything about her seemed washed-out, diminished from how she had used to be.

And yet, she couldn't tear her eyes away. She felt in some way as if she deserved this pain. That somehow her ugly body reflected her dead, empty soul within. Patricia yanked her listlessly away from the mirror, encouraging her to get dressed and come down for lunch.

"You ought to start seeing the therapist again, Barbara." Patricia had said later.

Barbara blinked, returning from her bleak reverie. She had been idly stabbing her cold, limp meal with a fork, barely eating anything. Patricia had looked at her with obvious frustration and sympathy, warring in her eyes.

"Dr. Whistler thinks you could make the most progress of any of her patients, if you simply applied yourself to the therapy, Barbara."

Barbara slammed the fork down, and seemed like she was about to say something, but then sighed.

"No need for such displays of temper, young dear. We're simply trying to help."

"I know! Ok? I...I know. I...just... God damn it, why can't I be normal?" She yelled with frustration, anger bubbling up. Anger was good, she knew. Anger let her do things she couldn't otherwise.

Patricia looked at her sternly.

"Barbara, if you need a time-out..."

"Time out? Time out? I'm not a fucking child, Patricia! I'm a woman of sixteen. People talk about me going to university or starting a job, but I haven't even finished High school! Its been a year since I've even had a...had a real friend, who wasn't just there out of guilt or some obligation." She tried to remember how she had channelled her anger before, using it as fuel. She remembered Ray's words. Make a fist of the pain.

She clenched her fist angrily, but did nothing with it, not yet.

"I want...I want to want things, and to be able to do them, and...and to make a difference." She mumbled, lamely.

Patricia looked at her. The stern black woman sighed, and sat back in her chair.

"Barbara, I have been by your side almost this entire past year. I have bathed you, I have fed you, I have cleaned up your sickness. I've let Wills visit you, even though he isn't family, because frankly, you needed someone to come visit you. But did you ever once consider why –I- was here? Do you think I could ever be paid enough for the time and effort I've put into looking after you?"

Barbara looked at her carer's sudden outburst with astonishment. She'd...she'd honestly never thought about it.

"I'm not just a city employee doing a chore, Barbara. There's plenty of others who'd do that, who've offered, but I alone have stuck by you. Maybe thats unprofessional, I don't care. But every day you're alive, you're making a difference. I know you don't want to hear about being an inspiring example or any of that, but let me tell you.

I'm here because I want to be. I can quit anytime. And Barbara, if you let this...this selfishness consume you, I will quit. Maybe you don't care. But I've watched you waste away, and said nothing, but I won't let you destroy yourself.

I want you to see Dr Whistler in a few days, and I want you to start physical therapy again. I know you want to be normal again, but there's the fast way and there's the right way. I want you to do it the right way, Barbara. You're sixteen. You have time, and you should use it. Stop pushing, and let us pull you up a bit."

The woman's words were well-meant, and the teenager felt sudden shame that she had overlooked the carer, that she had treated this woman as a constant, some robot-like assisted living machine. It hurt to know that she needed this woman, but this carer was a woman too. She could talk to her. She could...do something.

"Its...hard, Pat. It's so hard." She said, suddenly cold, bowing her head.

"I know. I know it's hard. But you do have hope, dear. You have to work through the pain. Your life is not over." The nurse said, encouragingly.

Barbara frowned, clenching her fist and grinding her teeth. She wanted control back, but she was still powerless. She'd been given something to want, she'd been given...answers, of a sort. But she'd also been reminded how impotent she was. She was impatient now, to escape the state she was in, to just...stop being the corpse she saw every day in the mirror, and be this bright, amazing hero, protecting the city, living up to her father's legacy.

Who wouldn't want that? It was almost too good to be true. A story that appealed to every part of her, her love of grand, spooky stories, her love of being the centre of attention, her wish for thrills both physical and intellectual, to push herself to her limits.

The trouble was, her limits now seemed to be walking up and down the stairs without fainting.

But there seemed to be only one way out. If she had been on her own, she knew, she'd have long since collapsed and given in. But at the same time, she couldn't help but feel that all these people, so earnest and keen to help, were holding her back.

But they –did- care, she knew. Just because Patricia had been assigned to her, just because neither of them had much choice in this situation, doesn't mean there weren't choices that could be made. Barbara had made a choice to ignore her carer without even realising it. Patricia had made a choice to go far above and beyond the scope of her official duties, had made a choice to become something close to a surrogate parent to the girl.

It was something Barbara had to respect.

"All right. I'll do the therapy again. Let's...go see the doctor at Arkham again." She said, with great reluctance. She was sure that Harley would be happy to see her again. But every time she passed those grim, frowning walls, she couldn't help but be afraid that she'd never leave, that she'd just...start laughing again, and never stop, and be thrown into a padded cell, never to see daylight, never to be Barbara Gordon again.

The fact that she'd have to do group therapy with some people who'd had basically that happen to them was...not comforting.

"Can we...can we order some takeaway in? I want...I want a bit of spice in my diet." Barbara said, pushing away her cold, drab lunch. Patricia looked at her for a long time, and then consented.

"We can work together, Barb. Don't be afraid to talk to me."

Barbara nodded. The carer was right, for now. It galled her, but she had to co-operate.

She would return to Arkham Asylum.


	8. Chapter Seven, No Easy Way

**Chapter Seven**

Fog blanketed Gotham harbour, a still wind and a low tide keeping many ships still in their moorings. Groups of out of work fishermen and sailors clustered around their radios, waiting for shipping forecasts to tell them what winter weather was coming. The Oil disaster with the Prospero Rig had seriously damaged the fishing industry for the time being, but now the prospect of a coming storm looked set to keep all but the largest ships in harbour. The fog wasn't much of an impediment in the age of GPS, of course, but there was grim talk of a series of later winter storms sweeping the Atlantic, and the possibility of a cold weather front bringing with it ice and driving snow.

Only a madman would travel in such weather, which made it ideal cover for the Riddler's operations. He stood proudly on the deck of his latest ship, the fog and dew seemingly repelled from his bright, crisp green suit. In his hands were a clipboard, feverish meteorology calculations and reports. He was utterly confident of his plans, of his months of research and analysis. It was critical in the early stages that there be plenty of bad weather. A physical storm to hide the metaphysical one he hoped to create in Gotham.

He looked ahead, peering through the fog, imagining the outline of their destination, the contours of the coast, his photographic memory perfectly recalling every detail of the pre-arranged landing site.

The ship glided silently through the waves, the only sound the thrum of the engine and the occasional tolling bell of buoys as they bobbed on the surf.

As their mooring site came into view, the Riddler grinned widely to himself, seeing his two favourite henchwomen waiting for him in matching green outfits. Query and Echo. As the hijacked boat bumped against the moorings, the crew tied up, eyeing their employer nervously. He had already killed one of their number, stuffing a message in his mouth. Edward idly wondered if anyone in Gotham had even looked at the message by now, let alone solved its ingenious riddle.

"Have my instructions been carried out?" He asked immediately, stepping on to the dock confidently, his leather shoes squelching across the wet decking.

"To the letter, sir." Query grinned saucily. Echo lent down, unzipping a bag she had carried, full of nondescript civilian clothes.

"Excellent. We proceed to Phase two." Query and Echo immediately began to unzip their uniforms, un-self-consciously changing into the new outfits they'd brought, handing Edward his.

The crew stopped in their work, watching amazed as the two women stripped to their underwear before changing. Riddler simply grinned. He was human, after all. Probably the only real human, in his estimation. Everyone else was far too much like a herd animal. to ever be truly worthy of the title _Homo Sapiens_.

"Hey, Mr. Riddler. We did what you asked. Are we gonna get paid now?" said one of the henchman, partly angry, partly nervous. They'd all seen what Nygma had done. But after seeing that he only had two women with him, their fear of betrayal had seeped a little.

"Oh, you have been wonderfully helpful indeed. I do suppose it is time for your payment." He said, turning to face the crew and the ship he had just left.

"Query, Echo, give these men their...just desserts."

"Gladly, boss."

They sauntered sexily towards the crew, who stood there grinning, hardly able to believe their luck. They'd been promised money, but this...

Their eyes were so fixated on the women; they barely noticed that thin, silvery blades had emerged from their sleeves. At least, until it was too late.

They did not make much of a mess, and the screaming didn't last long. The blades were precision weapons, needles for striking swiftly and directly at nerve-clusters and weak-points.

Once the crew had been disposed of, their bodies were methodically and quickly wrapped in weighted clothes smeared with whale-oil and chum, and rolled off the dock into the water. Sharkfood.

The Riddler changed effortlessly into his new outfit and checked his new identity.

He strolled off into the mists, confident Query and Echo could look after themselves, and would rendezvous with him later.

As he looked up at the grey, frowning building above him, he couldn't help but feel a slight pang of nostalgia. Arkham Asylum.

He was Home.

* * *

Detective Wills had thoroughly enjoyed his enforced week away, though he had spent much time brooding on ghosts. Without work to crowd his mind, he had been forced to spend more time than he was comfortable admitting to anyone dealing with his anxiety and guilt.

Perhaps that was why he had tried so hard to be a father to Barbara. He remembered that Night with clarity. He remembered leading the way, barely behind the SWAT teams. The chaos, the horror, the realisation that someone had set the building on fire, the smoke... It had been the stuff of nightmares.

And through it all, there was niggling doubt in his mind. A needle of thought jammed into his brain. _You could have saved them. If you'd been quicker. If you'd worked harder..._

Finding the dead girls in the basement had been hard enough. Finding those still alive had been worse. Finding Barbara and Jim... he had suppressed bile at the memories. Jim had made him promise to look after her with his last breath.

He had wondered often how much she remembered. What she remembered. As far as he could tell, even though she was now recovering, she'd said or done nothing to show memory or grief. She'd simply locked away all the darkness, all the horror, into a great cage within her soul, never to be opened or examined ever again.

Knowing the truth, he supposed he couldn't blame her. He'd only arrived after the fact. In time to pull them from the flames. Too late to truly save them. Too late for the most important event.

And he'd been late for the stupidest reason ever. He'd not gotten Jim's message, not realised that Jim was going –then-, alone, without backup, to save his daughter. He'd had his phone turned off, because he had been asleep.

He had been caught napping on the most important day of his life.

And so for a year he had punished himself, visiting Barbara as often as possible, burying himself in case after case. Afraid to sleep. Afraid to let himself dream, and see the faces again.

So for a week, he had distracted himself in another way. He had watched most of his collection of Lex-disc movies. He had played a bunch of video-games Montoya had lent him. He had even gone out for a stroll along the misty promenade, enjoying the cool feel of moist air against his haggard skin.

He'd left some messages on Barbara's house-phone, tried to arrange some sort of outing to a restaurant, as friends. She'd eagerly accepted, though she'd regretted that she was busy. Apparently she was resuming her physical therapy, and was going to see Dr Whistler in Arkham Asylum again. He had been glad to hear the news, though sad that he was going to spend an evening alone. He could hang out with Montoya or Bullock at the bar, but he had taken Renee's advice to heart, and was trying to spend the entire week away from work, away from anything relating to the cases he'd been involved in.

The sad truth was, he didn't really have any other friends. He'd been a cop for twenty-one years. Almost everyone else he had graduated with; had either moved on or was dead. The Joker had sent death threats to everyone in the MCU, of course. But the one he'd sent to Wills...well, that had been the most awful thing of all.

The Joker had said he wasn't going to kill Ray, because Ray had nothing whatsoever worth taking from him in his life. The biggest Joke would be to let the sad, work-obsessed man to keep living his boring, meaningless life.

They'd all laughed at the time, of course, seeing it as an admission of weakness, that the Joker couldn't kill anyone and everyone in the MCU at will. They'd wanted to see it that way.

But now, sitting in his apartment, some mindless movie about a fictitious group of WW2 heroes called the All-Star squadron playing in the background, he realised how accurate the Joker had been. Ray was a good cop, and nothing else. He'd always thought himself smarter, avoiding the drama and entanglements of his friends, commiserating with them on their divorces and heart breaks, but never suffering any himself.

He played it safe. He always kept his gun close to hand. He never stirred up too much trouble. He did the work, all of it, and got results. Every so often, he'd make use of discrete and high-class prostitutes, working off some steam. He'd never worked Vice, but he'd always been careful to keep good relations with them. He had no desire to be caught in a random bust with his pants down. But he hadn't done anything like that lately. He'd not had a serious relationship in nearly seventeen years.

He felt a pang of pain. Sarah Essen. Jim's first partner. A rising cop. They'd dated, but she'd been captivated by Jim. Ray had never felt jealousy. Jim had been a true friend, and he couldn't fault Sarah for choosing him over her. Even if it had led to her losing her life, gunned down as a warning by an enforcer of the Falcones.

He'd never really moved on after that. Perhaps that was where it had begun, he reflected, his face bathed in the glow of his laptop, mindless action streaming across its screen. He'd retreated into his work, and stayed there, and then retreated even further when the one man he had ever looked up to had been killed too.

He'd had thoughts on this subject before. He'd never seen any reason to change then, or at least never felt a strong impulse to do so. But he was becoming conscious of his age. His capacity to pull all-nighters was diminishing. He was starting to get serious coffee withdrawal if he didn't drink twenty cups a day. His body was a wreck. He'd been content to slide into oblivion, running his life on automatic, working case after case till he finally collapsed or was retired.

But seeing Barbara...seeing her youthful impatience, her sudden, fiery determination to get better, to rise from the ashes...maybe an old coot like him could find some meaning, some purpose in this life too.

He decided to see if he couldn't find himself a date, someone to ask out. The trouble was he only knew work-friends. The alternatives didn't seem that appealing. Back to square one, maybe?

He sighed. He'd think of something. Or maybe he'd just go back to work tomorrow, his vacation time over, and find something interesting to do there.

He watched the movie late into the night, and wondered if he should go see Holly. But since coming to know Barbara, he'd felt that frequenting prostitutes was well...a bit sleazy for a man who was partly the legal guardian for the daughter of a murdered police chief.

After the movie ended, he realised that if he was serious about...making friends or going on a date, he'd have to go out and make them. But where could a guy like him find a social life? The Internet? It didn't seem likely.

He sighed, and picked up a random book. The Tempest. He'd borrowed it from the library to work on the case. He was so bored, and still reluctant to sleep. He read it with difficulty, finding the old English hard to parse.

No, he decided. He still had a job to do. So long as there was the work, he'd do it. Maybe when he retired he'd look into this social life business. Besides, he enjoyed the work. A sudden idea came to him. Maybe Renee or Harv had some female friends in their address book. He laughed. He doubted the ones in Montoya's address book would be interested in him, and he doubted the ones in Harv's would be ones he'd be interested in either.

"At least there's always the work." He said to himself, sardonically, before closing the book, and turning in for the night.

Tomorrow he'd get right back into it. He was going to crack these murders, solve the Prospero Rig case, and bring in that damn "Judge" vigilante.

* * *

"I really like...cupcakes." Harley said, after a long pause, blinking to herself.

"That's very good, Miss Quinzel. Is there anything else you can think of that you like that isn't the Joker?"

"I...I like ponies. No wait, was it horses? I like..I like..." Harley grunted, her brow creased in concentration.

Dr. Whistler sighed, looking down at the profile in her lap. Dr Harleen Quinzel had been such a brilliant mind, with diverse interests, both pop cultural and classical. Of course, with the benefit of hindsight, it was possible to see a pattern in them, which helped explain why her...indoctrination had been so much more effective.

Barbara sat, bored, the only one wearing civilian clothing and not patient scrubs. The group therapy was supposed to help them communally bond or something, but the fact was that they didn't really have all that much in common.

Barbara felt like she was sane and didn't need the therapy, for one. That her problems were mostly physical in nature, that she could combat now that she had purpose and drive. A few weeks on a treadmill, she'd be donning that cowl in no time, she felt. Not that anyone but her knew of her ambition.

Next to Harley, a girl named Emily Barret sat. Emily had been on the school-bus with Barbara, and she had vague memories of being a school-girl. The trouble was, despite being now the same age as Barbara, her memories were all when she had been nine years old. She insisted on doing her hair up in pigtails, a style that Harley had quickly copied. Emily had then taken to threading her hair with blue ribbons, which had in turn made Harley beg the staff to thread hers with red and black ones.

Barbara sighed. The other group therapy Survivors were, as Harley had said at the Anniversary gala, mostly catatonic. Occasionally they made noises, but as yet no words, despite much coaxing.

"Well that's definitely progress, Harley." Dr Whistler's stern voice brought Barbara out of her reverie.

"Barbara, since you are a returning guest, why don't you go next?"

Barbara snorted at that. Even Whistler had seemed to realise the futility of trying to coax the other girls into talking, and Emily's problem was getting her to –stop- talking about all the things she liked, which included everything from the colour pink to the latest boy bands. Also, she really enjoyed playing crochet on the lawn. Efforts to prevent her doing this had met with extraordinary and sudden violence.

And so Emily stayed. She seemed to quite enjoy it in the Asylum anyway.

"Um, well, I really like the Dark Knight. I like curry now. I also enjoy all the stuff I said I enjoyed last time we did this."

Harley seemed to frown at the mention of the Dark Knight, but a stern look from the Dr kept her quiet.

"A different question, then. I'm told you have ambitions to be physically and mentally fit enough to go to University, yet you don't even have a GED. How do you hope to accomplish this?"

Barbara rankled at the supercilious woman's tone. "Easily. I'm Jim Gordon's daughter. And I have Thomas Wayne as a friend and patron."

"So you'll be relying on the privilege of others, and not your own merit?"

"Hey! Thats...thats not what I meant. I mean, well...I've got what it takes. I want...I want to be better now. I know I can make that happen. You just got to get angry enough!" Barbara realised she was raising her voice, and dropped it a lower tone, looking abashed. Only Emily seemed to notice, and she quivered like a young girl at the angry tones.

"Miss Gordon, Anger is a useful tool, but a poor master. I commend you for having purpose when you seemed so listless last time we spoke, but if you have simply replaced denial with anger, then I cannot say you have truly moved into the recovery stage.

Ah, Miss Barret, please don't cry.." Whistler sighed, and Barbara had the grace to look abashed.

Harley stuck her tongue out at Barbara. Quinzel could act quite childish at times, similar to Emily, but this was easily off-set by her often barely checked sexual and romantic obsession with the Joker, whom she insisted was still alive, somewhere. She also seemed quite determined to try to support her pale, clown-like appearance, whereas the other patients received skin treatments and makeup to help them adjust.

"Everyone please settle down." Dr Whistler sighed. "All right, this group session is over for now. We'll resume another time. Barbara, I'll speak with you in private later. You are of course, free to move around, but please avoid restricted areas, and stay within the Women's Wing."

As the session broke up, Barbara looked around the rest of the main hall, noting all the other women, young and old, in various states of incurable insanity. Some of them, she knew, were probably criminals who her father had helped inter here, their madness never to again bother Gotham.

It had been a long time since there had been any sort of escape attempt from Arkham Asylum, isolated as it was on its own island, close to but separate from the city.

Barbara had wandered out into the corridor, deciding to get some fresh air. The place smelt of sickness and anaesthetic. She fished around in her coat pocket, producing her bottle of painkillers, and took a small handful, swallowing them effortlessly. She was supposed to take them in moderation, but lately she'd realised that she could get a lot more done in a day if she took them periodically, like her other medicines. So far, it seemed to be working, and she no longer felt as prone to exhaustion as she had done.

As she paced around, she was surprised to see a man she recognised more by reputation than personal acquaintance.

"Ah, Mr Wayne! I'm sorry to bother you, I'm-"

"Barbara Gordon, I know. My father told me all about you. Actually, I was here on unrelated business, but I thought I'd take a moment to talk to you." Bruce gestured for her to sit beside him on one of the benches.

"I understand from my father that you have ambitions to...go to a certain University." He said, lowering his tone.

Barbara sighed. "I know, but...as you can see, I'm a long way from getting anywhere with that. But I will make it. It's just...god, It's just going to take so much time." She said grumpily, as she looked out on to the neatly tended lawns, whilst noting the occasional wandering patient and lunch-breaking orderly.

"Actually, I think I might be able to help with that. Wayne Enterprises is arranging for an experimental drug to be tested here at Arkham Asylum, a combination physical and mental performance enhancement drug. I...I can pull some strings to get you on it, if you like." The facially scarred young man grinned.

Barbara quirked an eyebrow, finding the way only half of his face ever seemed to smile somewhat disconcerting. Still, she knew she wasn't exactly in a position to judge anyone on facial disfigurement.

"Are you sure that's...legal, Mr. Wayne?"

"It would of course be at the final discretion of the supervising doctor, a good friend of mine, a Dr Leslie Thompkins, whether you were suited for the trials, of course." Bruce added, seeing the look on her face.

"But I think you have great potential. I know how happy it would make you, and my father, to see you make a swift recovery." Bruce leaned in, whispering into her ear. "I also agree that you'd make a fine...addition, to the team." Bruce leaned back up. "You don't have to answer now. Here, Dr Thompkin's number. I'll let her know you might be calling in a few days. I think this might be a real opportunity for the both of us. Please do consider it."

Wayne handed her a calling card for the doctor he had mentioned, before rising from his seat, adjusting his tie and checking his brown leather briefcase was still securely fastened.

"I'm afraid I have to go now. Have a pleasant day, Miss Gordon."

Barbara waved him off, but she stared fixedly at the business card she had been given. Experimental drugs? Trials? She wasn't sure what she was getting into, but given the way drugs seemed to be helping her now, what were a few more? It was certainly making things easier, and much faster.

She knew with certainty what her next move was going to be.


	9. Chapter Eight, Frail Bird, Strong Cage

**Chapter Eight**

Calling to arrange a consultation with Dr Thompkins had been easy enough. The problem, it seemed, was working out a way to attend the appointment without letting Patricia know. Barbara knew that despite their shaky move towards a stronger relationship, the overbearing nurse would find the idea of an experimental medical trial completely out of the question for a girl in Barbara's condition.

She swallowed back her frustration and anger at the situation. The carer was her legal guardian, and finding some way to subvert her authority would be paramount if she wanted to accomplish her goals. Yet she couldn't help but feel a degree of guilt and anxiety over making such a covert move from someone who she had only just recently promised to try to work with.

But it was easy to find reminders why she simply couldn't wait. She had attempted to leave the house and buy some groceries from a corner store a few blocks down by herself, and had nearly collapsed on the kerb after less than a few minutes, her whole body shuddering and choking. She'd quickly fished out her painkillers and anti-psychotic medicines.

It had taken her ten minutes to recover from simply trying to walk down the block, and she had to hobble back to the house, shamefacedly, glad at least that Patricia hadn't seen her fall or crawl back, her whole body bathed in sweat, her legs feeling stiff even with the medicines.

Her experiments with richer food had also met with frustrating set-backs. On the third day since she'd started eating more interesting food stuffs, she had suffered from severe stomach cramps, and vomited much of the last three days worth of food. She was getting really, really sick of the taste of her own bile.

"You need to pace yourself, Barbara. You can't go from oatmeal and soup to complex meals all in one go. And you shouldn't gorge on your food like that. Your body doesn't know when its full and you run the risk of over-eating." The nurse had advised her sternly.

Barbara had complied with frustration, returning to eating one or two simple meals a day, but refusing to return to Oatmeal. A bowl of rice, some spaghetti, or some potato salad, that would be enough to get her started. She'd also taken to indulging her sweet-tooth again, asking for and receiving a box of Twinkie cakes.

Patricia had started to suggest that she'd only buy the Twinkies as a form of positive reinforcement for the teenager making steady, sensible progress in her recovery, but Barbara's glare and a polite but stern conversation had convinced her otherwise.

"I'm not a child, Patricia. I don't need the promise of sweets as an inducement to behave correctly." she had said, and the nurse had apologised.

"You have been keeping your end of the bargain so far, miss Gordon. I am sorry, it was a thoughtless idea."

Barbara had not felt satisfied at the sincere apology from the carer. It had only made her ambivalence about her growing plan worse. Gordon had no intention of spending another two years having to endure Dr Whistler's therapy sessions, or the slow methodical pacing of her current physical therapy.

She felt certain that she would never prove herself ready to be the Dark Knight if she simply made a long, normal recovery. Now that the possibility had been fully unveiled to her, and a route provided, it seemed impossible to choose otherwise. The occasional discussion Patricia had tried to start about choosing college or considering finishing High School and getting a GED had been...difficult for the young woman. The idea of sitting in a class room and doing exams was more toxic to her now that she had seen and tasted an alternative. It was inconceivable to her that she could ever be a mere normal person now, striving to earn some sort of office job. Given her hospitalization, it was unlikely she'd ever be able to realise her full potential as a Police Officer or a Lawyer, either, but again both of those alternatives seemed to mandate long exhaustive hours in class-rooms.

Even if she did end up having to do those things as a cover, it would be so much easier to bear if she knew she could have the freedom, the thrill and the responsibility of being something so much more.

One benefit of this obsession was even her dreams had changed. Although sleep was still difficult for her to obtain, and she would still often find herself awakening in the night, desperately feeling feverish or needing to pee or vomit really badly. But it was no longer chill-inducing nightmares that filled the void when she did manage to sleep, instead she began to dream of running the roof-tops, a long black cape trailing out behind her, her hands like swords, carving through the demons of crime and the spectres of her past.

One week after she had spoken with Bruce Wayne, she had managed to get a brief slot with the doctor after her weekly group therapy session at Arkham Asylum. She suspected the young businessman and, she supposed, current Dark Knight- had a hand in making this discreet appointment possible.

As she sat down and braced herself for another hour of irritation in the company of Quinn and Emily Barret, she was intrigued to see that another new-comer had joined them.

"All right everyone, I'd like you to welcome miss Selena Kyle to our group." Dr Whistler said with her usual condescending tone.

"Hello Selena, welcome to the group. May you get better every day in every way." They had all droned together, those of them that could speak. Barbara analysed the new-comer with curious eyes. A pale woman in a patient scrubs and a wheel-chair, with long auburn hair and blank, staring eyes. Drool slipped from her lips as she gazed into space.

Another catatonic? Barbara thought at first, but she noted that the woman did not seem to have received the same type of...injuries that the others of them who had been subject to the Joker's special brand of "treatment" had. As far as Barbara could tell, this woman seemed relatively normal, as far as catatonics went. No bleached hair, no mercury-tainted skin, no rictus grin, no scars at the corners of her mouth. Her eyes, whilst vacant, did not have black rings, and whilst she certainly appeared to be fairly thin, it seemed more due to standard inactivity then any real chemically induced metabolism problems.

Barbara quietly wondered who this woman was, and why she had joined a group for Joker survivors, especially when it seemed obvious that, like many of the others, talking was far beyond her at present.

"Selena, why don't you introduce yourself to everyone?" Dr Whistler had said, with a bored sigh. It seemed she shared Barbara's thoughts on the futility of these exercises, but was compelled by bureaucracy to perform them.

The woman had not seemed to respond to her name at first, but then her eyes rolled toward the psychiatrist, and she had quietly begun to make a mewing noise. Was she crying? No, she was...purring, Barbara realised.

"Cat's got her tongue." Harley said, with a sudden burst of giggles.

Emily pouted. "That's not very nice, Harley. You shouldn't be mean to strangers. Unless they're bad..."

"Thank you, Miss Barret. Miss Quinnzel, your sense of humour needs work. It is not nice to laugh at other's distress." Dr Whistler droned automatically.

"Aww, but that's when its the most fun!"

Barbara simply stared, fascinated. Had this woman been...broken by the Joker, too? Where had she been all this time? Barbara thought she had met all the survivors, or at least knew roughly about them via the news or her visits to Arkham Asylum.

Later on, the woman had seemed to regain some degree of mobility and even awareness of her surroundings, but she had continued to behave in a strangely catlike manner, in so far as one could when they are wheelchair-bound.

It piqued her curiosity, and made enduring the rest of the session much easier.

* * *

Afterwards, she had all but raced to her appointment, eager to meet this new doctor, who she felt sure would usher her on to the road towards becoming the Caped Crusader.

Dr Leslie Thompkins had been about what she had expected. A grizzled, middle-aged woman, possibly even older, her greying hair tied up in a bun, her white lab-coat faded and worn from years of wear and tear. Like Whistler, she seemed tired and withdrawn, but her fatigue was more from age and exhaustion than being worn down constantly by enduring the company of the mentally challenged and disturbed.

"Ah, miss Gordon. I was told to expect you. Well, let's get this over with. Before we begin, how much have you been told about these trials?"

"Some sort of experimental physical and mental enhancement drug?" Barbara said, barely restraining her eagerness, her feet kicking idly as she sat in the provided guest chair, looking at Thompkins across a faded mahogany desk.

Leslie's lips twitched a little. "Not quite. Miraclo is a special form of phosphorus, which to cut down on a long, technical explanation, gives a great energy boost to muscle cells. The energy released gives the subject increased strength, a feeling of invulnerability and heightened stamina for about an hour. After that time, the substance burns itself out, and the waste toxins generated need to be eliminated in the bloodstream over about a 24 hour period."

Thompkins looked at Barbara's face, and sighed. "Did you understand all that, miss Gordon, or would you like me to use smaller words?"

"I understood perfectly fine, doctor." Barbara snapped. "It sounds like a performance enhancement drug, similar to steroids." Although her education had been cut short, Barbara Gordon had, as Cobblepot had surmised at their meeting, been something of a bookworm, and she had picked up a rudimentary understanding of chemistry and medicine from her reading. She'd also been fascinated by the way the boys on the football team had become hunks, and she'd found out about steroids from one of the quarterbacks.

"An apt enough comparison, I suppose. However, this particular formulation's waste toxins have some...unusual neurochemical properties, which Wayne Enterprises could be used to aid in the recovery of those suffering brain damage, among other things."

Thompkins sighed, and she produced a manilla-folder, which Barbara noted was her case file here at Arkham.

"I'll be blunt, miss Gordon. You're not the type of patient we're looking for. As fun as getting pumped might be for you, your brain isn't physically damaged, and the...side-effects might cause behavioural defects or neurochemical imbalances, which as a young woman who hasn't finished puberty yet, would be very dangerous for you indeed."

Barbara held her breath, waiting for the doctor to continue. She was not going to react to this news, not when she had come so far, and everything had seemed so close...

Thompkins got up out of her chair, and locked the door, before turning on the radio, and a jaunty tune began to play.

"Forgive me for the paranoia, Miss Gordon, but I wanted to speak candidly. I've known Thomas for years. I interned under him when he was still a practising heart surgeon. I chose chemistry eventually, of course, but we remained firm friends, and he hired me into his father's company as soon as the old Wayne- that is, I suppose, the current Wayne's grandfather finally kicked the bucket.

In plain terms, I know exactly why your here, and why Bruce wants you to undergo this insane plan." Leslie glared at her, her eyes fixating on her like a Medusa.

"If it wasn't for that friendship, you would quite simply not be here. I would have howled Bruce down, and prevented you from contacting me any further. But he told me to give you a chance. Even though this flies in the face of everything I have spent two decades learning and practising as a chemist and as a doctor, I'm supposed to take you on to an experimental trial, and, worse, make sure I give you the drug, and not randomly assign you to a placebo group in accordance with double-blind procedure."

Barbara held firm, undaunted by the woman's obvious frustration and cold anger. She wasn't going to flinch from something as simple as a raised voice. Not after all she'd been through.

"And yet...?" She'd asked, after the silence had dragged on a bit too long.

"And yet, Miss Gordon, I am going to give you that chance, and to hell with Bruce Wayne and his fucking company. If you so much as start to cough funny in this trial, I will bring the edifice down with the mother of all malpractice lawsuits. I don't care if it ruins my career, or if I'd be the one found guilty, I will drag that arrogant son of a bitch to the depths of hell with me if this goes wrong.

So, you have an awful lot of power in your hands right now, Miss Gordon. I want you to be absolutely perfectly honest with me in every respect. I am not going to let you ruin yourself to pursue some cockamamie dream that an arrogant billionaire gave you because you happened to be the daughter of an old friend.

If you do not comply with my requirements, if you do not achieve perfection in every regard, if you slack behind or ever try to dose yourself faster or with more of the substance, or even just try to administer it yourself without me there to personally hold the syringe, I will throw you out and off this trial so hard a new god-damn island will rise in Gotham bay, is that clear?"

Barbara found herself resisting the temptation to smile. "Absolutely crystal."

"Good. We'll start next week. Bring me the signed consent form and we can start on paired intake/exercise that very day, or at least conduct some preliminaries. I hope to high heaven that you are every bit as capable as Bruce and Tom think you are..."

"Got it. I'll see you then." Barbara had said gently, though inside she felt both elation and frustration. A consent form? Damnit. Could she forge Patricia's signature?

No, she realised. She was going to have to go with her original plan, and somehow convince her other legal guardian in Gotham to do it. She was going to have to presume on her friendship with Detective Ray...

As she left the doctor's office, she allowed herself a full, warm smile, for her own benefit. She knew she could do this. One last hurdle, and she'd be on the fast-track to recovery, of that she was sure. She was a little concerned about the idea of what steroids might do to her, but given the way her figure was now, gaining muscle was probably an improvement. She could quit any time if things got out of hand, of course.

As she sauntered jauntily down the corridor, lost in her own reverie, she barely noticed where she was going, and almost bumped into a man in a doctor's outfit.

"Ugh! Watch where you're going, you mindless simpleton!" The doctor had cursed irritably. She brushed herself off and apologised, but he simply muttered darkly.

"What sort of place is Arkham running here these days anyway?" the doctor hurried off, muttering to himself.

"Don't mind him, that's Dr. Ned Eigward. Brain surgeon whose just come over to treat us crazies." A calm, friendly male voice said, coming up behind her.

"Thanks, sorry, I had my mind on..." She turned, and froze, looking up into the smirking face of someone even she recognised.

Victor Zsasz. The Serial Killer. The tally man. Arkham Asylum's most dangerous inmate. She stared at him uncomprehendingly, before he burst into laughter, holding his hands up, showing the cuffs, and as he did so she realised he was also being escorted from behind by two gruff orderlies.

" Don't worry ma'am, we're taking him to see Dr Thompkins. Move along now." They said, hauling the powerfully built maniac along roughly.

"Frail bird. Maybe I'll set you free from your cage sometime." He laughed at the look in her face, barely wincing when the orderlies jabbed him in the stomach with the end of a baton.

"Stow it Zsasz. You really want another session in the shock chair with Eigward?"

Barbara shuddered as the killer was hauled off, feeling his gaze still boring into her even after he had left. She realised that if she was serious about becoming the Dark Knight, she was going to have to overcome her fears, and to learn to fight again, and soon. She opened up her pill-bottle with shaking hands, and dispelled her anxiety for now. She couldn't let anything distract her from her goal now.

It was then she remembered where Zsasz had gone. What could Thompkins have wanted? Surely she wasn't going to give...but of course, it made sense. Who better for a guinea pig in an experimental medical trial than someone like Zsasz?

But it was too late to back out now in her mind. Tomorrow she'd have dinner with Ray like she'd promised, and find some way to get him to sign that damn consent form...

* * *

The Riddler brushed himself off irritably. That clumsy girl had nearly knocked him over. Still, his earlier meeting with Victor Zsasz had been most productive. For all Query and Echo's many talents, sometimes you needed a real brute, raw, stupid, and completely biddable. He would make the perfect tool in his coming plans. He smirked to himself. They were even going to pump him full of drugs to make him even more ferocious and brute-like.

Sometimes, Edward sighed, it really was almost too easy. The sheep of Gotham were fattening themselves for the slaughter.

This was no longer merely about drawing out a Dark Knight, in Nygma's eyes. Just because a story needed a Hero, didn't mean it wasn't the Villain's story as well. He would draw the hero out, and then show once and for all to everyone that he was the true master, the true overlord. He would be feared and worshipped, and the Joker and the Dark Knight he had fought would become but a faded memory next to his magnificence.

He couldn't help it. He had to laugh, at least a little.

Some passing orderlies simply looked at the maniacal laughing scientist, and shrugged. This was Arkham, after all.


	10. Chapter Nine, Judgement and Wrath

**Chapter Nine**

For the second time in the span of a week, Rebecca Mulcahey found herself awakening in unfamiliar surroundings. At first she could see nothing, and she groaned inwardly with terror and realisation. "Not again..."

Her arms and wrists were bound with chord, and she could feel hard wood pressing against her back and rear. She was bound and tied to a chair. Suddenly, the hood was roughly pulled away from her, and she squinted as sudden, harsh light was thrown on to her face, her head throbbing from where she had been incapacitated.

As she struggled to resolve shapes in the glaring light, a dark figure approached, and slammed its fist into her gut, making her retch and cough, all wind driven from her lungs.

"Awake, bitch? Good. You're gonna tell us everything we want to know, and maybe we'll let you go afterwards..." a nasty voice said. As she coughed, her vision blurring, the sight of her assailants and circumstances slowly swam into focus.

An ugly grinning thug stood over her, massaging his knuckles. Sitting at the back of the room, seemingly bored, was one of the people she least wanted to see. An elegant businessman, wearing white chinos and a summer jacket, a thick Cuban cigar twirling in his fingers. A man of wealth and taste, who also happened to hide his face behind a Black Mask.

One of the most powerful crime-lords in Gotham, the Black Mask and his False Face society controlled petty crime operations and the flow of high-quality narcotics. Key to his success, Rebecca knew, was his ability to turn bent cops to his exclusive use. He more than anyone alive now had influence over the compromised and traitorous among Gotham's Law and Order system.

"Black...Mask..."she breathed, her heart pounding, feeling a sinking feeling. Unlike with the strange woman before, she knew she had absolutely no chance of leaving this room alive. All that remained to be decided was how much pain she would feel before then.

She felt the blow before she see it, a sickening crack as two of her teeth were knocked clean out of her mouth, the thug's fist bloodying her jaw without hesitation.

She sobbed openly from the pain, her mind too disoriented to make much sense of things.

"You don't speak unless its to answer a question, whore. You ain't worthy of the Mask's time."

Black Mask simply watched, his grinning death's-head concealing his true emotions, his body language of languor and ease, even as a woman was savagely beaten before him.

"Go ahead and ask her a question then." He spoke, his voice cultured and smooth.

The thug paled, and nodded. "Right, boss." He pulled Rebecca's head up by her hair, causing her to gasp in pain.

"Alright bitch. Who took you from the Club? What did ya tell them? How come you were trying to leave Gotham in such a hurry, huh? You sold us down-river didn't you?"

She struggled for breath, the pain in her head and jaw intense. She looked up into the beady, hate-filled eyes of the thug, and wondered if this was really where her life was going to end. For the thousandth time, she cursed Jim Corrigan. He'd been good to her, and she'd certainly had her fun, but now it all seemed so petty compared to living in fear and being beaten up twice for her duplicity.

"I don't know who nabbed me, I swear! I told her nothing! She's some kinda vigilante, not a cop! No threat! I just wanted to get away-"

The thug didn't even let her finish. Letting go of her hair, he simply pushed her back roughly, letting her slam down onto the hard stone floor with a painful bump, the chords digging into her.

Before she could recover he was straddling her, and she realised with sudden panic that this interrogation would be nothing like the vigilante's. The thug pawed at her, grinning, producing a thin pocket-knife, and she gazed up at him with terrified, wide eyes.

"You lie again girly and I'll do worse than slap you around. Slut like you probably enjoys the rough treatment, right? Bet you don't know how rough I -likes- it, though." His hot breath was in her face, and she winced, turning away from her captor, tears streaming from her eyes. Anything but that.

"Enough, Jacob. I want to hear what she has to say." The Black Mask spoke.

The thug grunted, clearly disappointed, reluctantly pulling himself up off of the woman.

"Miss Mulcahey. I believe you when you say you don't know the vigilante. None of us do. But this vigilante has caused me a great deal of trouble. So you'll understand why I want you to tell me everything you can remember, what she asked you, what you told her, everything."

Though she could not clearly see the Black Mask from where she was now, lying on the ground, she could hear him walking over to her, his finely tailored shoes clacking on the hard concrete.

"She...she wanted to know if you...if you were the only one I reported to. Who...who else I knew you'd ah, done business with. I have always been loyal!" she added quickly, her voice ragged with fear and anxiety.

Surely she didn't deserve something like this. She'd only done what any cop in her position would have done. Okay, maybe she'd had more than her fair share of fun along the way, maybe done more than just the look other way occasionally, but everyone's gotta make money right? It just wasn't fair.

She felt hands on her, and she cried out in terror, but they were gentle, smooth, helping pull her and the chair back up. She looked into the grinning face of Death.

"Describe the vigilante to me. You described them as a she?" The voice was kindly, gentle, understanding.

Rebecca gulped, and began to relay everything she could remember, at first in a babble, but slowly growing smoother, calmer.

The Black Mask, despite his terrifying visage, nodded, like a kind parent. "I see. This is...most unexpected."

He turned to the thug. "I think she is telling the truth, but this...isn't what I wanted to hear."

"You want me to work her over some more boss?" Jacob's voice dripped with anticipation. Mulcahey shuddered.

"No, that won't be necessary." The Black Mask turned back to her, looking her straight in the eyes. He spoke directly at her, his voice lacking all emotion or civility, cold as ice.

"Wrong vigilante. She's worthless to us. Kill her."

Jacob looked as if he was about to object, but sighing, he produced his knife again, and walked around behind her.

"No! Wait, please, I can tell you more-" she begged, desperate to live just a little longer.

The light suddenly went out, leaving them in total darkness.

"Shit." the Black Mask said.

"Boss-"

"Not a word. Leave the girl. Get the men."

Rebecca sat, terrified, as the two men quickly left her, an iron door opening, letting a little dim light in, before slamming again. She waited, her heart hammering in her chest, unable to see anything, her head and jaw throbbing, her skin stained with sweat.

She prayed that the two men would not return. After a few minutes alone in the darkness, she prayed that they would.

* * *

The Black Mask hurried out into the warehouse, reaching into his jacket smoothly for an ivory-handled pistol. He waved to Jacob. "Silence. Gather everyone. Equip yourselves with fire-arms. Stick together. Kill the intruder."

Jacob nodded, and ran off to join the rest of the crew. Mask calculated, and decided discretion was the better part of valour. He fled quickly to his secret bolt-hole. No one could know about it here, not even any of his staff. He had a feeling that what was coming would be over soon. What the girl had told him...he frowned. Inconsequential.

In the darkness, the thugs called out to each other uneasily, as they tried to get the emergency power back on.

"Frank, you there?"

"That you Greg?"

"Wait, where's Grant..."

Suddenly there was a sound like nails being dragged along a chalkboard, followed by bursts of gunfire in the darkness.

"Aacgh!"

"Greg! Fuck, he got Greg!"

Chaos reigned. Jacob quickly broke into one of the crates he'd been looking for, sweat beading his brow. He'd been with the boss a lot lately, and he had an idea of what was coming. He fished out the heaviest weapon he'd ever seen, an M240 light machine gun. He clicked the safety off, and got down behind the crate, resting the tripod on it, setting the sights and aiming down into the warehouse. Nothing could come from behind him. Whoever or whatever was coming would be in for a nasty surprise.

"Garth? That yo-aaaagh!" Another sound, wet and gruesome. Gunfire opened up all over the warehouse, and even Jacob could see they were giving their positions away with their panic firing.

He sweated, his heart pounding, his finger resting shakily on the trigger, ready to fire at the first thing that came this way.

Two figures broke, and started running towards him. "Stay back!" he shouted. "Stay where you are!"

A dark, heavy shape swung from the rafters, slamming into them, bringing them down. He fired instinctively, heavy barking noise deafening him. The muzzle-flash was painfully bright, illuminating glimpses of something from one of his worst nightmares.

When he let go of the trigger, the heat from the barrel radiating back at him, all he could see was shredded crates, and the two figures lying still and bloody on the floor. Where was...?

Movement, in the corner of his eye.

He swung round with a cry, switching to full-auto, and hosed the warehouse with his LMG, round-casings spinning off wildly, one scarring his cheek as it left the ejector port.

"Die you fucking monster!" he screamed.

He felt the gun click on empty, its magazine exhausted. So soon? It hadn't been that long. He quickly fumbled to eject the empty drum, but it was too late.

The figure exploded at him, huge, heavy, black as night, a face of a red-eyed demon looming in at him.

A long black cape, splattered in blood, blossomed out behind the figure, like wings of shadow. The moment stretched on infinitely as Jacob's eyes narrowed to points in pure terror.

The creature's claws swung into him, razor-sharp claws of vibranium, scattering him into the darkness. Jacob knew no more.

* * *

Black Mask hastened through the sewers, the stench making him gag. The stink was ruining some of his finest shoes, but he had to get away, damn it. Not much further now and he could get be at his private jetty, and be speeding away into Gotham Bay...

He felt the presence before he saw it. Something huge, menacing was coming. Coming for him. Beneath his mask he curled his lips in distaste. He would not succumb to fear! He was the great Roman Sionis, lord of crime! He looked behind himself nervously, swinging his pistol back and forth.

"Show yourself, demon! I know what you are! You think you can wear the mantle of the Dark Knight in this city? You are no hero! You're a murdering coward!" He shouted into the blackness, his words echoing through the dim sewers.

When no response came, he hurried on, almost tripping head-first into the sewage as he did so. He clambered through thin, winding tunnels, and at last could hear the roar of the outflow, and the sea.

Maybe he'd make it out? He turned around one last time...

It slammed into him like a freight-train, and he coughed with surprise, falling back against the grate, splattering sewage water running along his suit as he was pushed against the wall.

"You fucker! This suit cost ten thousand dollars! I'll rip your face off!" He snarled, and grappled with the black demon. Red eyes burned into his, but he felt no fear. This creature's mask was demonic, but his was death. He would triumph here.

He felt his arms being forced back with incredible strength, and he cried out in pain, every muscle in his body screaming for release. He tried to fire a shot, but his pistol was banged against the wall, and the shot echoed, ricocheting painfully off the walls, his ears ringing in the confined space.

"Aaagh! You can't kill...me..." He roared, and head-butted the creature, his iron-mask slamming against the alloyed plastic of the demon's.

The demon staggered back, even as Roman's head rang, dizzy, blood thundering in his ears, his eyes swimming.

"I have you now!" He shouted in triumph, turning his pistol back quickly, emptying the whole clip in rapid succession at the monster, dry firing for a few seconds even after the magazine was spent.

The monster staggered, and dim light from above shone down, illuminating the figure more clearly for the first time.

A shadowy, flowing cloak, draped from broad shoulders. A cowl, thrown back, and a slender head clad in a full mask, night-vision goggles built in around the eyes. A blank, ridged face, like an insect's black carapace. The mask was splattered with blood, and had a small dent where the Black Mask had head-butted him.

The body was impressively muscular, almost impossibly so. Two huge clawed gauntlets extended from around the wrists, the fists encased in heavy metal gloves. The burly figure's chest was emblazoned with a silvery eagle-like design, resembling a highly stylised W. Bullet-marks marred the design and the chest armour, but no blood flowed from them.

Black Mask realised he was screwed. He did the only thing he could think of doing, even as the demon recovered. He dove into the sewage, and felt a strong current pull him away almost immediately. The stench was overpowering, and he could feel all manner of things flowing alongside him. He held his breath, even as nausea rose to overwhelm him.

The creature simply looked back at him, before speaking for the first time, in a powerful, husky voice. "You can run, Roman, but no one hides from the Wrath!"

The Black Mask felt chills, wondering how on earth this vigilante garbed like a demon had found out his true name. But before he could think much more, he found himself spilling out into the sea in a stream of raw shit, plummeting into the dark ocean...

His fight with this newcomer was only just beginning.

* * *

Rebecca Mulcahey groaned in the darkness, sobbing with terror. She was relieved when the door finally opened, and almost shrieked when she saw who. It was the faceless woman from before!

"Quiet. Are you hurt? Can you move" The Question asked, running to untie her.

"A little. Uh...yeah...I can move." She said, rapidly untangling herself, massaging her wrists. Without waiting for further comment, the Question grabbed her roughly by the arm, and began to haul her out.

"Hey! You...You can't just haul me around like a piece of meat..."

"Shut up, or do you want me to leave you here?" The Question hissed through her teeth.

Rebecca shut up, though she nearly cried out when she saw the torn, bloodied mess that had once been Jacob, a machine gun broken in half lying strewn about in pieces by his eviscerated corpse.

"What the..."

"Keep moving. You don't want to be here when he comes back." The Question said, anger and frustration in her voice.

They ran silently through the warehouse, past bloodied bodies, looking as if they had been hacked apart, looks of terror permanently frozen onto dead faces.

Outside, a van was waiting. The night-air was cool and misty, and Rebecca could see her breath coming out in ragged puffs. In the distance she could hear the wail of sirens.

"The cops will be here soon. I trust you don't want to explain why you've been missing for a week and just happen to be at the Black Mask's base of operations?" The Question asked sardonically.

Rebecca blushed, and started to stammer, but the Question shoved her roughly into the back of the van. It was none too soon, as she heard something heavy running at them.

Emerging from the gloom of the warehouse into the cold was a monstrous figure, a man powerfully built and clad from head to toe in black grey and silver, great swathes of red blood splattered across all of it. His cloak billowed out behind him as he came to a sudden halt, mere yards from where the Question stood.

She reached unhesitatingly into her pocket for her police side-arm, cocked it and aimed it at the blood-splattered monster.

"I don't give a fuck who you are or why you're doing this, but you're not killing any more people tonight." She said with absolute authority.

"Ah. The Faceless woman. I hear you call yourself the Question now." The gravelly voice spoke, with obvious dark humour.

"You think yourself an Agent of Justice, perhaps? There is no Justice in this world, Captain. There is only vengeance, and Wrath." The figure looked as if it was about to leap at her, at Rebecca watched with terrified eyes as the two vigilantes squared off at each other. Mulcahey had no doubt who would win such a fight. There was no way her faceless saviour could withstand a monster with claws like that.

The Question tensed, her hands tightening around her grip. Somehow the man- this...Wrath, she supposed, had known her rank, which suggested it also knew her identity. That was definitely not good. She aimed for the head, noting the bullet-marks along the chest, and hoping that the vigilante's mask wasn't as tough as his chest armour.

For a few seconds they regarded each other this way, before the wail of sirens suddenly became a lot louder, police cars skidding on the icy roads as they rounded the corner, heading down the street their way.

The Wrath turned, and, without further word, vanished back into the gloom. The Question sighed a huge sigh of relief. "We better get out of here. Now."

"Where are we going?" Rebecca asked with alarm.

"Only place I can think of. Home."

She put her foot to the pedal, and the van sped off into the night. She had no real idea why she was saving someone as scummy as this bent cop, but she felt instinctively that leaving her to be killed by that...that monster, would have been fundamentally wrong.

She smiled thinly to herself under her own mask. The honour of killing the ones who betrayed Jim Gordon would be hers, and hers alone. And she'd do it the right way, or not at all.

Rebecca clung to herself, shivering, wondering just where life was taking her next.


	11. Chapter Ten, A Little Evil

**Chapter Ten**

The restaurant was nothing too fancy. A standard chain restaurant with a slightly more upmarket "diner chic" aesthetic, varnished wooden bar-tops and tables, green-tinted windows for a friendly mood in the evening, bright ceiling lights shining down.

Barbara sat uncomfortably in a booth seat, waiting for Ray to arrive, Patricia sat opposite her. This was the first time in a year she'd really been properly out in public, and the occasional stares and glances that were shot her way were a little...uncomfortable. It was hard not to imagine everyone judging her, and finding her worthless or repulsive because of her facial disfigurements and anorexic body.

She focused on the menus in front of her. At least it wasn't a clear plastic sheet, but a proper velvet booklet. There was a lot of very rich and fancy stuff. Her impulse was to buy the most fancy sounding thing on the menu, but the truth was that she did not have control over her finances. Her stepmother and Patricia were joint trustees of her money until she turned eighteen, and only then could she access not only her own account but the small fortune her father had left her in his will. It had mostly passed her by, she had still been recovering in Arkham, but the reading of the will had apparently surprised quite a number of people in the family. Her father had left almost everything he owned to her, his only daughter, with only a smattering of other dispensations given to favoured charities and organisations for the support of Police widows. Which technically included Barbara's step-mother, but Janet had been estranged for a few years now and had seen the inheritance division as a snub, and was avoiding Barbara. It was a little unfair, she supposed, and if she really wanted she could probably reach out now and rekindle the friendship the two had managed to forge while Jim had been busy with police work.

Barbara's mother, on the other hand...that was a far more complicated relationship.

"What will you two be having, please?" Asked the waiter, a shy young man who looked to be going through college. Barbara offered him one of her thin, weak smiles, and she was a little hurt that he seemed to blanch at that, though he didn't turn away.

"I'll have the Steak and fries, and a glass of diet coke." She said lamely, her plans to dine on something grandiose forgotten. She'd like to keep this food in her stomach for once, and she didn't want to interrupt her opportunity with Ray by rushing to the toilet because she'd gotten too adventurous and ordered seafood or something.

Patricia ordered some Burritos and a glass of wine, and the waiter quickly disappeared.

"I'm sure he'll arrive soon." Patricia offered. "He's probably late because of police work."

Barbara nodded. She'd expected as much. Her head throbbed as it swirled with thoughts. She'd thought this over a thousand times, covering every angle she could think of. She absolutely was going to get this form signed, and secure her access to those drugs. Her new-found and pretty much only ambition in life was to become the Dark Knight. She'd started doodling ideas of costumes she could wear, doodles that Patricia had found amusing, and encourage her in, perhaps seeing her art as another form of therapy.

"It's very kind of you to come with me to the restaurant like this." Barbara said, mindful of her promise to try and engage with her carer. Patricia seemed to want more from her, so she'd at least pretend to make the effort, even if she was already planning ways of subverting her carer's authority, and accelerating her recovery by less...conventional means.

"You've been making progress in your physical and mental therapy. And in truth, I enjoy Detective Wills company." Patricia smiled with good humour. "Not really my type, but he has a good heart."

"The group therapy is useless. Half the participants are incapable of participation, and the rest seem like they don't want to get better." Barbara said with frustration, idly rolling sauce packets over and over in her fingers. She'd developed a habit of compulsive fidgeting when bored or irritated. A side effect of having very little to do whilst cooped up at home, she supposed.

"Dr Whistler seems to think you'll do fine. I'm told she wants to see you more for single sessions?"

Barbara resisted the urge to smirk. That was probably more of Bruce's doing, a way of explaining her going to Arkham more often and for longer periods, to cover her participation in the upcoming Miraclo trials. If she hadn't been so obsessed with achieving her own goal, she might have given more thought to why Bruce Wayne was risking so much by enabling her like this.

"Something like that. I really feel like I can accomplish something in the physical therapy, though. I've managed to beat my previous best times on the running machine twice in a row, now." she said, with obvious triumph. It was difficult for her to conceal all of her feelings about accomplishing things towards her true goal.

Patricia looked a little concerned. "Just be careful you don't strain yourself. You're still very thin and prone to muscle fatigue. It wasn't too long ago I had to help you out of the bath."

Barbara made a disgusted face at the memory. She hated being reminded of how weak she'd been, how weak she still was. But they'd come to a sort of arrangement, and Patricia for her part was trying to give Barbara more opportunities to do things on her own. The trouble was, Barbara was still having difficulty making the most of those opportunities, and she'd taken care to conceal how often she had to stop and pause for breath or simply recover her composure from doing something too straining.

Their drinks were placed on the table, and Barbara quickly began slurping on her diet coke, more from boredom than thirst. It was hard for her to find interacting with her carer that interesting, particularly given how much time they spent together anyway.

"What do you do when you aren't looking after me, anyway?" Barbara asked, finally driven by boredom to be more curious about her nurse.

"Oh? Well, not much I suppose. Sleep, go home, feed my cats, watch the hockey, fill in forms, report every so often to the Mental Health Board, the usual stuff." Patricia said, caught slightly off-guard.

"Anyone else in your life? Husband? Family?" Barbara pressed.

"Well, no. My family..." She hesitated. "Let's just say I can empathise somewhat with your family situation. I'm single right now, not that that's any of your business, young lady."

Barbara tried to put on her best innocent face, and failed. Her smirk was genuine and for once she felt no hesitation or fear about letting her face show her emotions.

The carer was about to retort when Raymond finally arrived, looking out of breath and somewhat exhausted.

"Sorry I'm late, ladies, you know how it is..." He quickly took off his hat and jacket, spreading them on the back of the chair, facing the two of them. He looked somewhat healthier than when she'd seen him last. Evidently his time-off had done him some good. She wondered idly about his parallel recovery with hers. Perhaps his words, which he'd probably forgotten by now, about them being partners had had more truth in them than the old gum-shoe realised.

She remembered her childhood enthusiasm for being a Detective like her father. It wasn't hard to imagine herself following in those foot-steps, even if only as a cover identity for her true purpose in life. Though she couldn't see herself having much time for the rules and regulations of the GCPD. Being a Private Investigator on the other hand...

"Ah you two already ordered? Ah I'll just have a burger and fries. It's good to see you again Babs, you're starting to get a bit of weight back on those bones eh?" He joked, his words interrupting her reverie.

She smiled at him, and unlike the waiter he didn't flinch at all. She began to talk, really talk with him. It seemed easier, somehow, to engage with the detective. Even if she couldn't really express the full truth behind her thoughts and ambitions, she felt she could relate to his work, to what she presumed was his motivation, his drive. She really did imagine herself, in some way, as his partner in crime.

Ray blinked, and did his best to answer her questions, and respond to her outpourings about her recovery, her ambitions on police-work. The table became lively, and even Patricia joining in, her glass of wine becoming several, and Ray allowed himself a bottle or two of beer.

Despite the nurse's claims that Ray wasn't her type, she seemed to enjoy flirting with the Detective, who took it in good humour, despite being at least twenty years older than the nurse.

"And thats when Gretzky delivered the final blow to the Kings! I got so excited I tore my shirt off and threw it down at the Habs from the stands!" Patricia finished a particularly ribald story about being a teenager at the 1993 Stanley Cup finals. Ray seemed to be blushing also, and Barbara could well understand that the Detective was imagining the somewhat homely African-Canadian nurse in a new light.

Barbara grinned like a Cheshire cat, enjoying the company of friends- real friends, she supposed- for the first time, even if they seemed somewhat awkward around her and one another.

Realising she was a little drunk and blushing at the inappropriateness of her story, Patricia quickly made excuses. "I'll uh...just go to the ladies room. To freshen up. Do you want to come, Barbara?"

"No, I'm fine right now. You go sober- I mean, freshen up." She'd teased, a little surprised at her own ability and instinct to lighten up. Apparently good food and good conversation had really effected her. She'd almost forgotten her purpose in coming to this restaurant to meet with Ray tonight.

With Patricia gone from the table and Ray eyeing the dregs of his beer, she knew this was her chance. She quickly fished the somewhat creased consent from from where she had concealed it in her shirt-sleeve.

"Ray, can I have a moment of your time please?"

"Sure, uh...what's this?"

"I just need you to sign this form for me. It's nothing that big." She lied smoothly, sliding it and a Biro into his hands before he could object.

"Uh sure...what's this about?"

"Oh nothing too important. Some bureaucratic nonsense up at Arkham Asylum. I didn't want to worry Patricia about it, and she'd probably have to get my stepmother or my mother involved, and I'd rather that didn't happen." She explained quickly, encouraging him to sign.

He looked at her frowning, his mild inebriation not blunting his instincts. "This is something you don't want Patricia knowing about isn't it?"

Barbara tried her innocent face, but again she failed. "I just...I want to be normal again, Ray. Enjoying what Patricia enjoyed. A normal life. This could really help me get there much quicker, instead of spending the rest of my young adulthood reliant on drugs and idiotic therapy sessions in Arkham Asylum." She pleaded quickly.

"Barbara-"

"Ray. You said to me a few weeks ago that if you were my partner, you'd tell me to go out there and raise some hell. Your words meant a lot to me, Ray. I appreciate what you have done for me, what no one asked you to do, but you did it anyway. Maybe you just did it because my Dad was your boss, but I don't think so." She reached out, holding his hand, holding his gaze earnestly, needing him to do this, determined to persuade him. She could not afford to fail here.

"This consent form will allow me to receive new drugs from Wayne Industries, that will help me accelerate my recovery. I firmly believe that without these, I won't be able to sustain my recovery. You and Pat have talked about me attending University some day, but lets be realistic. I don't even have a GED. I can barely walk to the end of the block right now. It could be years before I'm ready for anything like that, well into my twenties. I...I can't wait that long, Ray. I can't endure years more of this. Please, help me."

Ray sat back, regarding her with analytical eyes for a long time. Finally, he expelled a breath. "Barbara. I trust you. I know you're probably not telling me the whole truth here but..." He took the pen, and began to sign it.

"Damned If I haven't done worse for Jim's sake." He smiled. "Do what you feel you need to, kid."

She smiled back at him warmly, a wave of relief spreading across her. But a part deep within her felt a thousand times more awful. She'd pressured this man into giving her what she wanted, and she hadn't even trusted him enough to give him the full truth.

She hesitated, wondering if she should explain it more fully. He deserved that much at least, surely.

But before she could resolve her mind, Patricia came back, and Barbara quickly concealed the consent form and pen once again. She gave Ray a grateful look, and he simply winked at her.

The evening continued at a slightly more sedate pace, and after dessert Barbara could tell it was time for her to leave. She had one other small way of thanking the Detective.

"Well this has been a tiring evening. I'm so glad I got to talk with you again, Ray. Please, I'm sure Patricia won't mind if you visit us more regularly." Barbara said smoothly. Encouraging her two guardians to hook up might not be a great idea, especially if the idea was for her to have one conceal something for her from the other, but a girlish part of her still found the idea oddly appealing and childishly romantic.

Patricia gave her a dark look, and this time Barbara managed to convincingly fake looking innocent.

"I'd be honoured. I've let the work rule my schedule too much. I'd be happy to check on you two again." He grinned, defusing the situation, and gave Patricia a cheeky wink. She rolled her eyes.

"Young lady. We will have words about this later." Patricia said in a mock-threatening manner. "Detective. Have a safe journey back. I'm sure we will meet again." Despite her words, Patricia's tone was clear. It seemed her plan had begun to work.

All in all, she thought to herself as they left the restaurant, it had been an excellent night. She'd accomplished everything she wanted to. She should be ecstatic. But somehow, deep within, she felt queasy. Was it the food? No. She'd manipulated her friends, and concealed the truth about her participation in an experimental drug trial.

She should be more concerned. But how could she be? Everyone was getting what they wanted. What Patricia didn't know couldn't hurt her. Barbara would begin her road to becoming a Superhero, and her two guardians had potentially discovered an interest in one another.

Who said you couldn't do good by being a little bad?

* * *

Harv Bullock put a rag to his mouth, trying vainly to block out the wretched smell. The warehouse was cold now, its doors flung wide open, police officers and a gaggle of forensics techs having entered and cleared the way.

But even with the cold air, it couldn't hide the smell. The cold temperatures were hoping slow the rot, but they weren't stopping it completely.

He knelt down by a body, one that had looked like it had been torn in half. Little numbered yellow signs were scattered around. This guy had emptied a whole clip's worth of M240 ammunition around the warehouse. This crime scene was a mess.

"This the Judge's work?" A CSI asked nervously.

"Absolutely." Harv said grimly. Apparently people were starting to take his "crazy pet theory" seriously. This guy wasn't just picking off cops and crooked lawyers now. He'd attacked one of the Black Mask's key warehouses, and made mince meat of his best thugs.

"We're trying to get a trace on where all these illegal fire-arms came from. It seems this was probably a stopoff point for the hardware, but where it would go next or where it was coming from, we're not really sure yet."

Harv grunted non-committally. "I don't really care. Let ATF worry about Black Mask's guns. I'm more concerned with who or what could fucking do -this-." Harv gestured to the bloody carnage around him. Despite being frighteningly well armed, the thugs had been murdered with a ferocity that made even Bullock's stomach churn.

"Any sign of Mr Gruesome himself?" He asked vainly. If Black Mask himself had been caught up in this...

"No. We found some kind of escape tunnel that leads down into the sewers. We didn't follow it all the way along but it probably connects to the main run-offs down by the docks."

Well at least there wouldn't be a turf war breaking out any-time soon, Harv thought. The Black Mask was as bad a sonuvabitch as any of Gotham's Crime lords, but having him murdered like this in an out of the way warehouse would have sparked bloody anarchy in the streets, all the jackals and vultures racing to grab what they could of the Mask's empire.

Harv looked around, mentally picturing the fight in his head, counting bullet shots and seconds and imagining trajectories. This guy couldn't have avoided all of the bullets, even if he'd been an eagle or a cat or something. Which means he was wearing some serious heavy duty armour of some kind. Ex-Black Ops? Someone with access to military-grade tech? It was a disturbing possibility.

Harv knew of at least one way a vigilante could get their hands on stuff that good. He'd had suspicions about who the Dark Knight had been, back in the day. But those suspicions were blown out of the water by this. If the Dark Knight had been who he'd thought it might be, they'd -never- in a million years have behaved like this. Of that Harv was certain.

No, this Judge was definitely a new player. Someone who seemed to enjoy getting their hands dirty.

"Any metal fragments you've found? Vibranium. I want all these casings and bits of metal crap everywhere examined pronto by the materials lab. We're looking for Vibranium."

Whatever this ass-hole's MO was, Harv knew, it couldn't be allowed to continue. Killing bent cops and tearing up thugs was one thing, but who knew where it would end? Anyone this crazy had to be stopped on principle alone.

Looking at the broken fragments of a crushed M240 light machine gun, he mentally amended that.

Assuming anyone this crazy _could be_ stopped.


	12. Chapter Eleven, Finding the Right Pace

**Chapter Eleven**

The Question hurried her new charge out of the van, dawn's rays breaking on the city. Rebecca was still shaken and confused after their escape from the Black Mask's warehouse, and the long van drive out of the city had been a mostly silent one, her saviour and captor angry and focused on the task ahead.

For Rebecca, her whole world had been turned upside down in the space of a week, and she found herself adrift, cut free of all certainties. Once she had been cocky, secure in her position as a Lieutenant in the Gotham City Police Force, and as a favoured mole for the Black Mask's crime syndicate, turning a blind eye at his command and passing on details about others who could be turned.

But now both those lives had been violently cut away from her. The Black Mask himself had ordered her killed, and she doubted she could ever show her face to any of the GCPD ever again. Even if they didn't know who or what she had been, it would not take much now for it all to come out. There were...questions that would be asked. And Rebecca no longer felt able to glibly lie, and conceal the truth. Not when the faceless vigilante beside her seemed to know everything.

They were somewhere in the suburbs, far to the west of Gotham City proper, halfway into the next city almost. They had come to a small summer-house, off the main road, and there was the sound of dogs barking.

The Question hammered on the door of the summer-house, impatience and anger still fuelling her. Rebecca simply stood, quietly, hugging herself to keep warm, as the first rays of daylight broke across the sleepy community, a scattering of houses and a lot of trees and fields.

A city girl all her life, Mulcahey had never been into the country like this before. She hadn't even known there was a place like this outside of Gotham. She'd been abroad of course, but only to other cities, other places and foreign countries that had been comfortably, familiarly urban.

Now she was a stranger in her own country, reliant entirely on another faceless stranger. Rebecca found it difficult to understand why she had not been left to die, or simply turned over to the police. But she said nothing.

Finally, the door opened a crack, on a safety latch, and a harsh glaring woman with red hair and pale skin frowned.

"You...? You come here, at this time...?" The woman began to speak angrily, but the Question cut her off.

"Kat, we don't have time for this. I need you to take this woman in. Shelter her for now. No questions. Her life is in very grave danger. I can't trust anyone else with this."

The redheaded woman looked furious, and, more than that, still half-asleep. It -was- pretty early in the morning.

Finally, she sighed. "Well I can't have you freezing to death on my porch, I suppose I better let you all in."

She opened the door, revealing a tall, lithe woman in a dressing gown and not much else. A sawn-off shotgun was cradled in her arm, and two slavering dachshunds at her feet started barking them. She shooed them away. "Come in. They won't bite unless I command them to."

The Question turned to face Rebecca, sighing. "Come in. In for a penny I suppose..."

Seeing no other course of action, the formerly corrupt ex-cop followed. At least it would be warmer inside.

* * *

Later that morning, Ray found himself called in by Harv to help with the Warehouse Murders. Renee had apparently called in sick or something, which was something almost unheard of for the stalwart woman. It was so rare that they'd taken her at her word, and for now MCU was deferring to Homicide and a liaison from ATF on this case.

"Office politics, pure and simple. I envy Renee her flu, she won't have to deal with this bullshit for a while." Harv had joked, but Ray hadn't been listening. He'd been staring at something in his pile of work, something that had gotten overlooked, and which was now burrowing its way into his brain.

"The ATF think this is just some gangers fighting over control of an arms shipment, which is bullshit. They're poaching our case to try to score brownie points with the fat-cats in Washington. They've already started disseminating press releases about cracking down on illegal gun-running through America's most corrupt ports." Bullock shook his head, as he tore open a sugar packet with his teeth. He was making himself a fancy cup of coffee at the desk, another way of jibing his partner, who he saw as having fancier tastes.

But of late Ray hadn't really been properly noticing or responding to their usual subtle banter and in-jokes. He'd been consumed by this business with the Prospero Rig case, or, more accurately, consumed with its implications to the burdens he carried from the past, his legacy from Jim and his guardianship over Barbara.

"Anyway, I've got some guys dredging the sewers and the back-flow, see if they can find any trace of the Black Mask or his escape, if his body got dumped elsewhere or something. Man, I wish I could get something on the Judge, even a photo, a shred of fabric, something. This guy is good, he doesn't leave any witnesses or traces." Bullock sounded almost admiring of his imagined Nemesis.

Breaking from his fevered train of thought, Wills made an effort to respond to his partner, his voice shaky and pale. "Yeah...Harv...how do you uh, even know there is a Judge? ATF could be right..." Even his voice sounded weak to himself. His gut told him that Harv was almost certainly right here, but he felt now they might have bigger problems.

Harv turned, frowning. "You OK, Ray?"

Ray picked up the report from the Coast Guard, now two weeks old, and showed it to his partner. "You were right. The Lunatics are back. Our first clue."

Harv grabbed it from his hands, reading it thoroughly, his face paling.

"A Riddle? Stuffed in a dead guy's mouth?"

"The Placement is no accident. The body was down-current from where the Rig was. Whoever this psycho is, he wants us to know he did this, but on his terms."

Harv muttered, trying to work out the content of the riddle, and failing. "I don't get it."

Ray took the report back, and read the Riddle out loud.

"_I was the thirsty mountain now aflame_

_I am the hall a million faces but no name_

_I will be the storm of winter, shrouding all_

_Eternity holds but one of me_

_Nations hold only two_

_Invisible I hide, now three_

_Growing in my pride, I become two again_

_Master my name, for I am only one_

_Anwser, and prove yourself human."_

Ray looked at Bullock, who still looked baffled. "Well, I can figure out part of it. The thirsty mountain now aflame is clearly the Prospero rig he blew up."

"Now, come on Ray, you can't leap to-"

"Whose leaping to conclusions? You think a Judge is going around murdering cops and crime lord's henchmen." Ray chastised his partner. "I think whoever gave us this Riddle is sending us all a message. The second part of the riddle is him showing off. It's clearly to indicate the name "ENIGMA", which means a mystery without an answer. He's taunting us. Whoever this Enigma is, he wants to show off, prove his superiority over us. That's why the clues. Its no...fun, I guess, if we don't try to figure it out." Ray paced now, his mind whirring with thoughts. "Man, he must be frustrated that the Rig's being brushed off as an accident. Or maybe he isn't. The...two other lines at the beginning. He's planning on making other...displays, I guess. I was, past tense. I am? Something he's going to do now. I will? Something he'll do later."

Harv looked at his partner slack-jawed, and then he burst into laughter.

Ray was derailed. Whatever reaction he had expected, it hadn't been this. "What? I'm not joking, Harv! This is all deadly serious!"

Harv continued to laugh, pounding the desk. "I know, I know...I'm sorry...it's just... I haven't seen you this alive about a case since...well, since we were tracing the Joker."

Ray frowned, as Harv regained control of himself, shaking his head, and the mood turned sombre again.

"Ray, you've ground yourself to fine powder over these boring as shit cases for a year or more. Even after that little break of yours I could see you were determined to throw yourself back into it. I know you've looked after Babs and what you've done for her has been saint-like. But this case... It's just good to see the real you back, Ray."

Wills didn't know quite what to say. He looked completely bewildered by his partner's sudden change of tone.

Harv continued. "Ray, I believe you. Whoever this...Riddler is, he's clearly someone dangerous to the city. Probably one of the old school Lunatics, thinking its safe to come out again now that the Dark Knight is dead. You're right...I don't know if my Judge even exists, but I feel it in my gut, and I am not gonna let ATF roll me on this one. Which is why I want you to go back to investigating this Prospero Rig case."

"Well, Harv, I'm not sure you or I really has the authority to do that, whatever we might think."

"No, but since when has that ever stopped either of us? I know Renee will sign off on whatever you need. Even if you have to do this on your own time, I think if nothing else it will be good for you. You need a real mystery, a real case to sink your teeth into. You figure out this riddle and catch a Looney. The papers called you a hero for the Joker business, but we both know that wasn't no heroism, no case to go out with. Let this be your case. God knows, Gotham could do with some more real Heroes around here."

Harv chuckled to himself, before sipping long at his coffee. "Go on. I can handle ATF and the Warehouses and all this murder crap. You followed these trails. Who knows? We might end up crossing paths."

Ray sat there for a moment, confused. He didn't have the words to communicate how he felt, how his partner here made him feel. He briefly remembered his chat with Barbara last night, and how she'd said she saw him as a partner in a similar vein. He smiled at the memory. He'd tried so hard to be a surrogate father for the girl, that he'd been blind to what was going on within her now. She was coming out of her shell, and she was impatient to be an adult, to be given real responsibility and real opportunities.

He guessed he could sympathise with that. He hadn't even realised how meaningless the work had become. His life being empty of anything but the work was one thing, but for the work itself to become simply a rote mechanism...No, Harv was right. For once, all modesty and bullshit aside, Ray knew with absolute clarity what he was going to do.

He took the report with its riddle, and started putting on his coat and hat. Bullock grinned at him.

"Where you going?"

"To catch me a Riddler." He said, grinning back, full of confidence. In truth, he didn't have the faintest idea how he was going to do that, but it would spoil the effect to say "Going to hit the streets and talk to some sources."

After Ray had left, Bullock turned back to his own mess. He cracked his fingers, downed the rest of his coffee, and started to type e-mails write reports on his computer. It was much less glamorous and pulpy than Ray's own exit, but it was just as full of resolve and action. Bullock was going to wade neck-deep into these damn turf-wars, and by god if he wasn't going to emerge at the other end with this damn vigilante in cuffs and the Black Mask's whole operation laid at his feet.

It was time to call in some old favours.

* * *

Thompkins grimaced, reading the crumpled consent form, looking back and forth between it and the somewhat scrawny teenager who sat uncomfortably before her, fidgeting terribly.

Finally, the old doctor spoke. "All right. I'll let you on the trial." she said, with obvious reluctance. "Before you start celebrating, I remind you of the conditions we spoke of last week. Do I have to repeat them?"

"No Dr. Thompkins." Barbara replied, barely concealing her mounting excitement. Finally! She was going to start making some real progress! Somehow, running a treadmill with a cocktail of drugs pumped into your arm felt a lot more exciting and invigorating if you knew that at the end of it the person who had arranged things for you was going to turn you into a Superhero.

Well, that hadn't been explicitly said, but it was what she believed in her heart of hearts.

The older woman sighed, taking off her glasses and rubbing her eyes. "This whole business is ethically compromised from beginning to start. I doubt I'll even get anything useful out of this trial scientifically speaking, you and Bruce have completely trashed any hope of that."

Barbara managed to look bashful. The older doctor clearly needed to vent some steam. "Its bad enough that I have to take on dangerous psychopaths like Zsasz onto the trial, it's quite another to subject a girl such as yourself to the rigours of untried physical enhancement drugs."

Barbara squirmed a little at the mention of Zsasz, remembering her brief meeting with him in the hallway.

"No, I can see the look in your eyes. You won't ever be alone in the same room as him, nor will he know exactly why you're on this trial, if even finds out you are. I'm keeping all the trial participants separate. Its...unfortunate you found out that he was even participating." Thompkins grimaced. She'd had stern words with Arkham security after she'd found out that Zsasz had run into Barbara the other week.

"I understand, Dr. Thompkins. Ah...When will I start taking the drug?" Barbara asked, failing to conceal her obvious impatience.

Leslie flicked the air irritably, as if swatting away an invisible fly. "Probably not for another few weeks at least If I have anything to say about it. You responded remarkably well to your chelating treatment in the past few months, and there is virtually no trace mercury or other toxins or neurochemicals remaining in your system. As for the strength of your body and its ability to endure the...rigours of this regimen and the drugs we will be pumping in..." She let out a long expellation of breath.

"Honestly, I can't be completely sure about anything. The whole purpose of this trial was to find out how humans react to Miraclo in a controlled environment. There have been some...preliminary uses of it already, of course, mostly in military capacities. But you didn't hear that from me. But in all those cases it was healthy adult males. I dread to think what this drug will due to a young girl's system."

"Dr. Thompkins, I know I...may not look much at present." She indicated her somewhat slender, stick-like arms as she spoke. "But before all this I pursued a very vigorous exercise regimen, as well as self-defence training and a number of physical sports. I know what's expected of me. I hate how weak my body is now, but I'm no fainting flower. I can deal with pain. Just so long as I can make use of the strength you give me, I'm not all that concerned about side-effects." She said harshly. Truth was, there was nothing much she could think of losing to this drug that she hadn't already lost in some way. Food was blander, her taste-buds still recovering. Her intestinal system was shot, it was still hard for her to keep anything she ate down. Her skin would likely remain deathly pale for at least another few years before the epidermis fully healed, assuming it ever did. Her facial scars would probably never heal without major surgery. And whilst she was not technically sterile, any children she did attempt to have would be stillborn or worse as a result of the damage done to her cells.

By contrast, a chemical like Miraclo would bulk her up and make her a little angrier at times. It hardly seemed much of a risk or sacrifice at all, not with what it promised to give back to her.

Strength. Respect. Agency. Responsibility. All of these were things she felt she now sorely craved, and saw this trial as her best and only real path of obtaining these things, and fulfilling her mounting obsession of being the new Dark Knight.

She hadn't spoken to Thomas since that night at the manor, or Bruce since their encounter at Arkham two weeks ago. But she felt confident that they were monitoring her progress, watching her, waiting for the right time to step in, and reveal her legacy to her.

She would have her freedom, she smiled to herself, and she would have the legacy of heroism that her father had left her.

"For now though, I want you to continue your physical therapy sessions, and see if you can adjust your diet to increase your protein intake. You are going to get a lot hungrier when we start the drugs, Miss Gordon, and the more energy that you can draw upon the quicker and easier it will be for you to adjust to the...changes that the substance will work on your body."

Barbara nodded. "Of course. Shall I change into my sweatpants and hoodie now? I don't mind a few hours on the running machine right now."

The doctor snorted. "I doubt you could keep a decent pace for more than ten minutes, let alone a few hours. But since we will be pushing you very hard indeed when we do start the drug, I suppose there's no harm in letting you exhaust yourself to delirium now. It is a feeling you will have to get very used to in the coming weeks and months, Miss Gordon. Simply getting you to the level that the rest of the trial participants are starting at will be an undertaking. I doubt you will ever be able to match...Mr Zsasz's natural propensity for strength."

Barbara smiled. "I'm not looking to compete with anyone, Doctor. Just become the best damn Barbara I can be."

"How trite. But if you do have...serious ambitions towards the path I believe has in mind for you, then I hope for your sake you can match that enthusiasm with ability." She rose from her desk, and opened the door for her patient.

"Now go burn off your own steam, young Barbara. You've been fidgeting ever since you sat down."

Barbara didn't reply, simply nodding her head and smiling inside. It was hard not to relate somewhat to the grouchy woman. She sensed that Dr Thompkins, like Barbara, was someone cooped up in a situation beyond their control, and was striving to exert as much of themselves as possible within a difficult situation.

It made Barbara Gordon immensely glad that she had the support of people like Ray and Thomas Wayne behind her. It would be a lot harder to realise her new dream if she had to contend with her mother or her step-mother.

As Barbara pounded the running machine later, sweat pouring down her face and her chest heaving raggedly, she remembered with a sour twist that in two weeks time it would be Thanksgiving. She'd have to deal with them again, it seemed. She just hoped she would be strong enough by then to cope.


	13. Chapter Twelve, Questions and Riddles

**Chapter Twelve**

Two weeks passed like a blur for the Major Crimes Unit. Renee returned to work after a few days, looking a little dishevelled, but eager to help. Two more new Detectives were transferred, a Detective Kovaleski and a Detective Palmer. Apparently the possibility of a turf war over arms-smuggling in Gotham had been enough to convince the Commissioner to restore some of MCU's lost prestige and capability. The trouble was, neither Renee nor Harv nor Ray believed that such a thing was about to occur or was occurring.

So, after some wrangling, they agreed to a plan between themselves. New girl Ally Kovaleski and new guy Ray Palmer would be paired together and given control of investigating leads on the arms trafficking that Black Mask had been involved in. They would also work with ATF, and Renee gave them more or less carte blanche to handle that case however they liked, instantly winning their support, since as young detectives cracking a case like this would be sure to make their names, and helped reinforce in their minds the idea that MCU was a serious unit where real work got done.

The fact that one or both might be plants sent to spy on the "old guard" barely crossed Montoya's mind.

Whilst they were busy with their wild goose chases, Montoya backed up Harv in the "hunt" for the vigilante who had murdered the goons at the warehouse. Apparently she had some sort of "anonymous inside source" who could confirm the existence of said vigilante, and that his pseudonym was "The Wrath." Bullock was a little suspicious of any anonymous sources, but he knew better than to question Renee on where she got her street Intel.

Ray had the harder task of gathering information on this "Riddler". It was hard to decide whether such a person even existed, and outside of MCU hardly anyone who wasn't a conspiracy theorist believed the Prospero Oil Rig explosion was anything other than an industrial accident.

His work was going with agonising slowness. In a way, this was helpful to him. He was no longer burning the midnight oil forcing himself to grind this or any other case. He had more time to relax, to talk with Barbara and her carer, the delightful Patricia. Ray had realised, even if Barbara hadn't, that Patricia didn't seem to have a surname. He found out it was Corman, and wondered why she seemed so reluctant to use her family name. He suspected that she'd become a nurse for someone like Barbara because of sympathy over family troubles.

But when he wasn't socializing with the carer or just making sure Barbara wasn't pushing herself too hard on her new physical therapy regimen, he was spending more and more time in places that were sleazier and sleazier, trying to get feelers out into the criminal underworld, hoping to find any sort of rumour or word on some crazed new player in Gotham, one with a penchant for riddles.

His next breakthrough, coming just a few days before Thanksgiving, was once again thanks to the Gotham Bay Patrol, who like the Coast Guard he'd gotten friendly with and asked them to forward any more really strange finds in their patrols, especially bodies with notes stuffed in them.

The recovery of some barely identifiable body parts in the Bay, not far from Arkham Island, was suggestive. They had been wrapped in whale-oil hide, and had apparently been thoroughly "nibbled" by the local marine life, before some chunks had made their way to the surface. Apparently even sharks had trouble eating all of a large human. At least, coastal sharks did.

If there had been any riddles attached, they would long have disintegrated or been torn apart in the waters, but one clue he'd been able to find- and at this point he started to question whether he was suffering from the same Pareidolia he'd accused Bullock of several weeks earlier- he'd found signs of question mark-like marks on some of the cloth the bodies had been wrapped in.

It was thin, but it was something. Of course, it was also something that didn't really point him in any directions. Even identifying the body parts had been impossible. They could have been almost anyone.

He was looking over tide-reports in a half-daze, a rapidly cooling cup of coffee by his side, when Barbara came up to him. He blinked, remembering he was at home, and she had been due to come over...oh, half an hour ago. Once again he'd gotten list in the minutiae of his work, and lost track of time, and, apparently, place. He blushed, realising she must have let herself in.

"Those lock-picking lessons you managed to bully your father into letting you have must come in handy sometimes, huh?" he asked with a grin, turning his full attention to the slender young girl.

"No, you just leave your spare key in the same place all the time. Come on, Ray, you're supposed to be a detective." she joked. "Patricia was going to wait for you, but when I told her you were probably wrapped up in your work -yet again-, she went and had a last look around the shops nearby before they closed. "

Ray smiled, and pushed his work away. Old habits did indeed die hard. But he was enjoying his time with Patricia Corman, and he was immeasurably relieved to see that Barbara was almost miraculously starting to look somewhat healthy again. Her skin remained weirdly pale and waxy, and her natural red-hair was still thin and wiry. It would be a long time before that damage ever truly healed. But he could see that her diet and exercise regimens were clearly having an effect, as subtle signs of muscle and body fat growth could be seen along her once largely skeletal frame. He noted she had also taken to wearing t-shirts that showed off more of her arms and her neckline, something she would have been far too self-conscious to do not too long ago.

"You look good." he said, and meaning it. "Any uh...trouble over the new therapy?" he asked nervously, unsure if he really wanted to know the details behind what he had signed for Barbara. He did still trust her, but he couldn't help but worry if his decision back then had really been made in the most rational frame of mind.

"No, nothing." she said, a bit hastily. "You want to catch up with Patricia? She's probably lingering looking at the sports goods shop. I think we re-awoke her passion for hockey, that or the season is starting up again, she's buying us all scarves." Barbara shook her head. Despite going behind her domineering carer's back, she was still impressed at how Patricia was making a real effort to open up, though her instincts leaned far too much towards the maternal and the cautious for Barbara's liking.

Not that it mattered now, of course. She smirked. She had barely begun the Miralco treatment and she already felt better than she had in ages. Her gains were few of course, but she spent as much time as she reasonably could every day training her body, often to the point of near-collapse from exhaustion. She ate far more now, too, slowly but gradually expanding her diet, gently introducing more carbohydrates to her fragile digestive system.

"Actually..." she said with a sigh. "There is another matter." She fidgeted awkwardly, uncertain how to broach this, finding grasping the subject difficult enough for herself.

"What is it, Babs? You know you can talk to me about uh anything. Well, most anything..." he said, mumbling awkwardly. This wouldn't be a feminine problem would it? He was definitely not ready to handle anything like that.

"No! Jeeze Ray, get your mind out of the gutter. It's about my...family. They're coming over for Thanksgiving. I'd like you to be there too." She said, releasing her worry with a sigh.

"Your family? But they've well...I mean..." He frowned. Both her mother and her step-mother, not to mention the other relatives, had largely kept their distance from the scarred "joker's girl", perhaps too traumatised by the death of Jim and the hideousness of Barbara's first appearance and behaviour. They had tried to be sympathetic at first, but in the weeks immediately after her "rescue", she had not been herself at all, and had said things that had alienated her family to some degree. It didn't help that even before the incident, she had been less than close with her mother, and had been an exhaustive handful as a teenager.

Even so, it had shocked Ray to his core when both women had more or less absented themselves entirely from Barbara's life. For months it had been just him and Patricia and the doctors of Arkham. For as bad as Barbara had been, what kind of family abandons their eldest daughter to suffer alone like that? It was hardly worth thinking about.

And now, for Barbara to see them again, at a Thanksgiving dinner, as if everything was normal again now...it was almost too surreal to be believed. He grimaced. No, this was one thing he would not leave her to face alone.

"If you need me, I got your back, partner." he said, trying to joke a little. But it seemed to be exactly the right thing to say, as her face was lit up by a warm and very human smile.

"Thank you, Ray. I just...It would suck if they got me angry again." she muttered cryptically to herself, but clearly relieved. "Patricia's offered to come too but I really don't think that would be...right. Knowing her she'd chew them out something fierce."

Ray nodded. "She would at that."

"Anyway, its a few days away and just...well, let's try and enjoy ourselves until then." She murmured. "There's some really nice training weights I saw in the sports store the other day..."

Ray followed her down, still not quite believing the transformation she had made in such a short time. Then again, it seemed her interests were still quite overwhelmingly narrow. She cared for little that did not directly or indirectly enable her to improve herself or her knowledge. It seemed at times like she had some sort of check-list or schematic in front of her eyes, and anything that didn't meet her private blueprints was discarded or ignored.

Barbara simply skipped out into the street, feeling energised. At times it was still easy to feel short of breath, but she'd gotten better at managing her energy. She'd taken so long to approach Ray and disturb his reverie in part because she was harbouring her energy and taking her time. Her body was still weak in many ways, she knew, and it would be long before she could even move as fast or as far as a normal person, let alone meet the superior standard of a superhero like she craved.

Bruce Wayne had called when she'd begun taking the Miraclo drug. He'd encouraged her to set her own pace, and to aspire to be the best she could be. He'd also promised that both of the Waynes would see her again in person before Christmas, if she wanted.

She very much wanted that. An opportunity to show off her gains, to prove that she was ready to learn how to be the Dark Knight...her every waking thought was consumed by this ambition, this desire to become something more, to become the antithesis in her mind of the Joker, who had tainted her with his poison.

She gritted her teeth and clenched her fists, dim memories surfacing. It was that taint which had driven her family away. She would never forgive the dead clown for that, or her family. Or herself. She was not big on forgiveness in general.

She schooled her face to stillness, and walked slowly along the street, dragging a bemused detective along behind her.

* * *

Katharine Kane inhaled the smoke from her cigarette, watching as the woman she'd sheltered for two weeks finally getting on to a bus for Star City. She sighed, leaning against the bus-shelter, the cigarette's heat a dim point of warmth in an increasingly cold winter. The weathermen were already predicting one of the worst winters in a long time, possibly in the century. She didn't much care. She kept to herself mostly, living her own life away from her shitty family.

She allowed herself a cold smile. Renee was kinda like the cigarette. A dim point of warmth in an increasingly cold life. Coming out had been painful for Kat, and she didn't envy Renee her triple-life, concealing both her lesbianism and her vigilantism from just about everyone.

She let out a long exhalation of smoke and breath, before extinguishing the cigarette with her boot. It was just typical of Renee that after their months of separation and coldness, no calls no nothing, she'd turn up in a cold morning with a wanted fugitive in tow. Sometimes Kat wished Renee would put half as much effort into her friendships and relationships as she did into the pursuit of Justice.

"God damnit, Renee. Dont get killed." she said to herself, sadly. That girl had a death-wish sometimes. She'd thought about making some sort of costume or suit herself, or just going out with a balaclava on and stalking Renee, to make sure she was safe.

But there had been that argument. The drinking. She couldn't save Renee. Only Renee could save Renee, maybe. She just wished sometimes it was clear if Montoya even wanted to save herself.

She watched as the bus drove off into the foggy morning, beginning its long-trip across America. Rebecca would ride it all the way to the city on the West Coast, hopefully safe from any reprisals by the Black Mask. It was far more than she deserved, Kat knew.

More than once the Question had raged and shouted, wanting to put a bullet in Mulcahey's brain, seeming to argue with herself as much as anyone else. But Rebecca had lived, and stayed, and a very uncomfortable stretch of time had unfurled, Rebecca living and lying low, not allowed outside, simply watching television or doing push-ups.

Talking had been forbidden, at first, but Rebecca had been full of questions. Kat had made up a bunch of lies, but even that had gotten boring after a while, and they'd reluctantly started to talk. Mulcahey seemed to be full of remorse for her shitty life, and at first that had been boring too, but it had gone on and on and Kat had finally started listening.

When Mulcahey had finally seemed finished, Kat had shared just two short sentences about her own life with the crooked ex-cop. That shut her whining up for good. It was the only time she'd felt any satisfaction about those facts in her life.

As the bus disappeared down the highway, she turned, reluctantly, trudging up the frosty path-way back to her house, to feed her dogs and get back to the life she'd been living before all this mess. She'd barely spoken to Renee at all during the entire ordeal, though Montoya had offered her gratitude to Kat very explicitly one night.

But that was the pain of it, really. Beyond giving Renee what she needed when she needed it, Kat didn't really have much to connect her to the driven detective-cum-vigilante. They both hated crime and the scumbag men usually behind it of course, but Kat just didn't feel the same odd driving frenzy that Renee did.

She wondered at her own inner peace, given her own rough background. What made her so different from Montoya? Why did she have a degree of inner peace, and why was Renee consumed by her demons?

She shrugged. She didn't have a clue, and she didn't really buy into that philosophy crap either. She was way out of all that crap in Gotham, and she was fine with things the way they were.

She just hoped that this Mulcahey girl thing didn't come back to haunt her.

* * *

The Black Mask fumed as he waited in the back-room of the Iceberg Lounge. Coming to Cobblepot had been a mistake, he was sure now, but after losing his arms-shipment and almost his life at the hands of this new vigilante, he knew he needed to take more drastic measures.

So he'd come to the one asshole in Gotham he felt half-way sure would even consider his idea. Even that wasn't very certain though.

He reached into the pocket of his new suit for a cigar, and grimaced at the memory. He'd smelled of sewage for a week, despite hundreds of showers and unguents. He'd even taken off his mask to wash it, and that was a very rare thing for him. Iron rusts, after-all, and his face...well, no one was allowed to see his face.

He waited impatiently, eyeing the guards at the door warily. His fingers rolled the cuban cigar around in them. He wished it was his pistol instead.

"Whats taking that fat bird-minded fool so long?" he mumbled, grinding his teeth.

"The Boss will be with you in a moment." the mook repeated tonelessly.

The Black Mask simply waited.

Finally, Cobblepot emerged from his private meeting, and Mask's was almost shocked by who he saw leaving the room with him.

"A pleasure to do business with you again. Do give Mr. Scarface my regards." Cobblepot oozed his usual charm.

Arnold Wesker, the mild-mannered free-agent who seemed to be the only one in Gotham who could speak for the notorious crime-lord "Scarface" nodded politely, before being guided back to the main Club area by some thugs. (Black Mask wasn't sure if the crime-lord was an Al Pacino aficionado or a genuine history buff. No one who'd met the puppet master of Gotham had been willing to talk about him, which was extraordinary given how persuasive the Black Mask could be.)

"What's he doing here?" The Black Mask snarled. " Are you trying on something behind my back, Cobblepot?"

"Please, there is no need for such dissent between friends." Cobblepot smiled. "Come into my private antechamber, and we can discuss this like men."

He beckoned the Black Mask inside. As soon as the door was shut, the Penguin turned around, his face contorted by a snarl.

"Alright Sionis, you snivelling prima donna. What do you want? And don't think you can take a high tone with me just because you have control over the guns and most of the high-quality narcotic s along the Waterfront. I know where the guns are coming from and I can get my own if I want." He took a heavy cigar of his own out of a silver-case, awkwardly lighting it with his crooked hands.

Black Mask grinned to himself under his mask, which was always grinning anyway. "Thats the Penguin I know. Now shut the fuck up. We have a problem. Again. A caped, masked vigilante, only this time one whose going straight to the killing, no dancing about or non-lethal intimidation crap this time. I told you the Clown wouldn't solve anything."

Cobblepot snorted. "You said no such thing. In fact I think you were most eager of all of us to bring that...rogue into our city, to finally kill the Dark Knight."

"Whatever. Look, we need to work together again, kill this fucker too. In fact it might be worth making some kinda pact, to get each other's back when there's a costumed freak running around..." Black Mask suggested.

"Why? He has only been killing cops and your boys so far, according to my sources. Why should the rest of us be concerned? And even if we are, do you really want to bring another Joker in every-time one of these fools turns up?"

Sionis shook his head. "No, but there's gotta be another way. It's killing our business. I got ATF all over my ass, swarming my warehouses. The waterfront's gonna be full of cops for weeks, especially with this Oil Rig business."

Cobblepot smiled cruelly. "You keep saying "our". It's only your business that's being hurt. I have just secured a -very- lucrative deal with Mr. Wesker there. No, I'm sorry Roman, I think you may be on your own for this one."

"Damnit, Oswald!" he exploded, slamming his fist onto the table. "You -owe- me one! You'd be just as screwed if the Dark Knight was still around! Without me, the Joker wouldn't have had any of the tools he used to finally get that bastard!"

Cobblepot frowned slightly. "Oh we're all well aware of that, this vigilante included if I'm not mistaken in my guess. And I owe nothing to no-one, you got that, -Ronan-?" he snarled, leaning in, his hot cigar-breath puffing into the death's-head mask.

Before the Black Mask could respond, there was a knock at the door. Cobblepot and Black Mask both turned, fuming. "This is supposed to be -private-" they both yelled in unison, as a shaken mobster entered.

"I'm sorry boss, but you said to come to you about this, no matter what."

"And by the sounds of it, I'm just in time, too." Another voice, speaking from behind the mobster.

A grinning young man with red-hair, wearing a green bowler-hat, a purple eye-mask which left the rest of his face uncovered, and a painfully bright pea-green suit, a pale green tie with black question marks imprinted on it completing the odd ensemble.

"Who the fuck are you?" Black Mask and the Penguin both asked simultaneously.

"Why, gentleman, I am the Riddler. And I have the answer to a Riddle that may be plaguing you."


	14. Chapter Thirteen, The Last Thursday

**AUTHOR'S NOTE:**

Will begin updating and revising the other chapters soon, which I feel have not met my usual standards for editing and finesse. Additionally I will add a longer Author's Introduction in the Prologue, as well as a more detailed warning on the content and possible triggers contained within this story.

If you are just joining the story, welcome. Things are going to get darker from here. If you are sensitive to or think you might be triggered by the following subjects, I highly advise you to read this only with extreme caution.

The themes of Depression, Post-Traumatic Stress, of Family Trauma, of Survivor Guilt and related mental conditions will be throughout this story. There have been and will continue to be lighter moments, and some moments hopefully filled with exciting action, but these themes will be present throughout.

Without further adieu, enjoy. Act One will conclude in two further chapters.

**Chapter Thirteen**

Barbara steeled herself for the most unpleasant thanksgiving of her life. The Thanksgiving that had occurred the month after her...initial trauma was a blur. She had still been in the hospital then. But now she was alive, conscious, herself, and she had to deal with...this.

She wasn't in the habit of drowning out reality with music, but she clutched the LexPod Patricia had given her like it was a life-support machine, its buds running on thin white chords into her ears, drowning out her tension with the heavy chords of a Torch Song compilation album, her favourite heavy rock band.

It made her feel fourteen again. Which seemed like a lifetime ago, but now she thought about it was probably the last time her life had felt entirely her own. She was hurtling towards adult-hood and she'd left the tracks a long time ago.

The car pulled up into the drive-way. Her mother's house. She remembered the odd weekends visiting here, ever since the first divorce. She closed her eyes, breathing in and out, while teen angst rock filled her ears.

"We're here." Ray said, drumming his fingers on the wheel. He could badly use a smoke. He sympathised with Barbara's inner turmoil. Returning to a family who had abandoned you...he shook his head. It reminded him of a triple homicide he'd once worked. Family man comes home from work one day. He wants his gazpacho soup served hot. His wife tells him its meant to be cold. So he puts her head in the oven and turns it all the way up to Gas Mark 8, and whilst she's screaming he finishes off his two kids, before sitting calmly at the table and finishing his soup.

That seemed logical by comparison to the traumas families seemed to inflict on themselves every day.

"Well, we can't sit here all day." he said, without an ounce of enthusiasm. She simply glared ahead, before pulling the buds out of her ears. He took that as a sign of readiness, and got out the car. The cold air hit him hard, like a hammer to the chest, his breath coming ragged. It was going to be a very cold winter, he could tell.

He helped Babs out of the car. She was wearing a thick sweater and long pants. It was a bit informal for something intended as a formal get-together, but it was comfortable, and the last thing Babs wanted to do was endure any more discomfort for the benefit of her family.

They walked up the drive-way, the detective in his heavy winter trench-coat, his fedora turned low, his gloved-hands guiding her protectively towards the front-door. It felt like he was escorting a prisoner to the lock-up. Yet for much of her life this had been Bab's second home, the place she spent her time when it was her mother's turn to have custody. It had been that way for at least seven years.

Babs glared up at the fortress of her enemy. She sighed, unclenching her hands for the first time since the drive had begun. It felt painful, but pain helped her focus, kept her awake and kept her sane.

The door opened before they could knock. Apparently they had been expected.

"Babs! Glad you could make it! This must be Detective Wills." Harry Barnes, a jovial man with an earnest expression and a University dean sweater and slacks, opened the door for them. Barbara-Kean Gordon's new husband, and in a sense Barbara Gordon's step-father. Not that she'd ever seen him as anything more than "Harry" at best.

Her relationship with her mother had been strained even before the Joker. Harry had tried his bestt to smooth things of course, but a young girl going through her teens and being raised by an often-away detective father would be someone difficult to warm up even in the best of circumstances.

And these were most definitely not the best of circumstances.

" ." Ray said stoically, speaking for Babs, who was still glancing around the porch and the hall-way, as if discovering an entirely new planet. Conspicuous on the wall by the coat-rack was a photo of Babs when she had been eight years old, laughing and smiling with her Mother when they had gone to an Aquarium together.

The joker-scarred girl deliberately avoided looking at it. As Harry took Ray's coat and stood nervously whilst Babs reluctantly took off her scarf and handed it over, Ray conducted his own analysis of the premises. A standard two-story detached house. Creature comforts. Warm, cosy. A place that was lived in, full of life. It was like the mirror opposite of Jim's house, where Barbara had convalesced for over a year now.

Where Babs had left her father's house largely untouched, a frozen moment tended carefully mostly by Patricia, keeping it a safe space for Babs to recover in, this house had changed, moved, and had the smell and style of a place that a family inhabited it.

As two large house-cats came padding into the hall-way, and the sound and smell and light of a family gathering in the dining room could be heard, Wills mentally braced himself for Babs's sake. It seemed a pleasant enough place, which he intuited would make the pain all the more acute.

They had simply moved on without her. He couldn't blame them for living their lives, but he still found it hard to understand why they had distanced themselves so easily from Barbara, or, having made the cut, why they now sought to naively bridge that gap, as if nothing had happened.

"The rest of the family's in the Dining Room. Jim Jr's still upstairs." Harry said, a little awkwardly. "I guess he's...still getting ready."

Babs said nothing. Her brother. She had somehow managed to forget about him. Until now. The memories threatened her sea-wall of calm, but only for a moment. She regained control, and looked up steadily, impassively, as if she was simply an acquaintance newly come to this family, like Ray.

"Oh, thats nice."

Harry seemed to sense a little of her mood, and faltered, but quickly brightened as he led her through into the Dining Room.

Mercifully, the room did not fall quiet when they entered. There were a few animated conversations going on. Only Barbara-Kean nee Gordon now Barnes turned, her face unreadable at the sight of her daughter.

The rest of the extended Gordon-Barnes clan was there too. Aunts, Step-Uncles, cousins, step-grandfathers and grandmothers.

Babs tried to remember her own grand-parents, now all dead, the last being her grandmother, her father's mother, who had passed away shortly before the Joker's reign had begun. Mercifully spared that tragedy, she knew.

Yet she somehow found it hard to imagine her grandma ever abandoning her the way her mother had. The thought steeled her. She held hard to that idea. She was the true daughter of Jim Gordon, the man who she knew was the Dark Knight. He was more than a father to her now. He was a martyr, a hero who had fallen killing the monster that had made her the way she was.

And the only thing, the only thing in her mind and heart was reshaping herself to be more like the Dark Knight, to be the champion that would banish such monsters from this world, and save daughters from having to live in worlds without their fathers and mothers.

"Barbara." her mother said.

"Mother." she replied.

"Hey dear, this is Detective Ray-" Harry began.

"We've met." Ray cut them off. He'd been Jim Gordon's friend for twenty years. He'd seen the marriage begin, the marriage bloom, the marriage fail, and everything that came after. What he hadn't seen, and still couldn't quite fathom, was how this woman's coldness towards his best friend and boss had turned into this seeming coldness towards the daughter.

She bore this woman's name, for Christ's sake. It was a puzzle, but one he didn't really have the right to go digging around in. No, he had a more important duty this Thanksgiving. Helping Barbara endure it, the way he had stood by her side for the Anniversary, and for her treatments, these many past months.

He gave Barbara-Kean a look. She returned that look, no hint of yielding in her resolve. His look said "I am your child's parent now. Not you." Her look said...nothing.

Babs pushed past them, seating herself at the table, determinedly not looking at everyone else. The smell of cooking food from the kitchen, the occasional laughter as the different gaggles of family members conversed amongst themselves. A few shot glances Babs's way, but most seemed...detached. Unengaged. Afraid, possibly. The ghoul-faced girl who until recently had had the most ghastly grin.

She was tempted to give them a smile just to see if they'd flinch, but she honestly was worried that if she started she'd start laughing till she cried. And that would be a sign of weakness.

She looked around, noting a few other children, most too young to properly understand what had happened, except that Babs was now not someone who came to this house. There was little Anna, of course, Harry's eldest by his own former marriage. There was Richard, and Peter, and a bunch of other cousins and half-cousins.

Somewhere in the mix would probably be Margaret Gordon, the woman who had divorced Jim most recently, and had been her step-mother. Her abandonment was the most perplexing. Trying to think about why Margaret, or Maggie as she had called her, the woman who had taught her about tampons and boys and showed her how to race quad-bikes...why that woman hadn't been there that year, was the hardest. So she ignored that problem, and focused on hating the easier problems.

"Would you like anything to drink?" Harry asked her, a little unctuously.

"I'll have a beer." She asked, bluntly.

"You're a little young-"

"Do you have a beer?" she cut across him, her eyes glaring with the fire of Hell itself.

"Yes." he finished, before reluctantly going to fetch one. Detective Wills suppressed a chuckle, watching this exchange go on.

"Careful with that death-glare, Babs, you might melt a hole in the wall." he tried to joke, sitting beside her to support her.

She looked at him, and the glare softened for a moment.

Then Jim Jr joined them, waddling his way over to the table. He was fourteen now, and clad head to toe in black Goth gear, a piercing through his nose, his once brown-hair now dyed raven-black. He even had pale make-up on, and black lipstick.

He began to open his mouth. Whatever it was he wanted to say, whatever it was he was thinking, Babs didn't care.

So she punched him.

* * *

The howl of the last wind of November was drowned out by the roar of trucks, as Black Mask watched the arrival of the first elements of the last convoy of the year begin to arrive at his depot on the outskirts of Gotham.

He smoked a thin cigarette nervously, the butt dangling from the thin slit in his mask, his lips sucking the smoke down hungrily. He had over forty men involved in this operation, and had armed over half with everything from Uzis to out and out assault rifles. He even had a sniper-team set up in the Tower, keeping a vigilant eye on the murky grey horizon for movement.

As the first truck came to a rumbling halt, its driver looking about nervously, two figures in grey hoods moved forward quickly from the shadows, throwing open the doors at the back, revealing a large stack of crates marked as being full of leather-ware. Briefcases, suitcases, purses, belts, backpacks and shoes. A second pair of grey-hood men ran forward to pull the driver out, patting him down vigorously, checking the cab for weapons or wires.

Black Mask watched all of this from the safety of his office over CCTV, a CAR-15 carbine lying on the desk in front of him, as well as a large battery-powered walkie talkie.

He'd gone old school to avoid wire-taps or NSA snooping. The guns were for something else, though. Something huge, armoured, red and that wore a cape.

The walkie-talkie crackled, as the grey-hoods reported in.

"Truck's clear, Big Black, over."

"I read you Grey One. Where's the Leather Polish? Over." he responded with a growl, flicking the cigarette away nervously.

The grey-hoods hacked into the crates, and quickly began cutting away false stuffing and stitching on some of the briefcases and shoes. Inside, packed tightly, were clear plastic bags filled with the purest cut Cocaine this side of the Rio Grande.

Black Mask let out a sigh of relief. Chances were the whole convoy was going to be like this. Eleven trucks in all, each carrying somewhere in the region of thirty to fifty kilos of pure Colombian White. A cargo of this magnitude came every year, at different times, but always helped fuel his Winter trade, when the ports were closed and the roads were icy.

They had come late this year, he knew, but it had been necessary. He'd doubled the security, then doubled it again. Business had been good this past year in Gotham, but the recent attacks by this... "Wrath" fellow, had quickly put Black Mask on edge again. He remembered all too well the days of the Dark Knight.

Let them say he was a paranoid nut, he sneered. But never let anyone say the Black Mask was a damn fool.

The first truck was quickly pulled into cover by more grey-hoods, and the truck driver was himself hooded- a black hood, of course- and taken to somewhere safe. Once the haul was safely analysed, they would be released, with a thick wad of cash.

Executing them all was messy, and word of his generosity on these high-risk runs ensured he always had a steady supply of patsies to use. Plus if things went wrong, no one could say he was being unfair.

The Black Mask was nothing if not fair.

The second truck quickly came rolling in, and he allowed himself to sit down, though not quite relaxing yet. He fidgeted with the carbine, dis-assembling and re-assembling it with practised hands. Although not a military man, Roman Sionis had long learned how to take care of his weapons, knowing they would take care of him.

"You better come, wing-boy." he growled. "We got a nice party for you and everything."

He remembered what that newcomer the Riddler had said. He hated to be a pawn in another's plan, but the green guy's ideas had made sense. He just hoped his plan would work. If not... Black Mask allowed his face inside to grin, matching the face outside.

If not, he had his own little contingencies.

* * *

The Question darted swiftly into the back of the truck, just before some tired goons slammed the doors shut. As the truck roared into life, she quickly concealed herself amongst the shifting, rattling boxes filled with all manner of riff-raff. The first few trucks had actual dummy goods, but as with any operation of this size, the goons had gotten sloppy, and in some the only thing between the drugs and the outside world was a thin layer of packing nuts.

She steadied her own breathing, and reached inside her pocket for her little data pad, bringing up the relevant applications with the stylus. She tapped away silently, as the truck bounced and roared around her. No one would notice her presence, she hoped, until she was way into the Black Mask's compound.

The problem was what to do once the truck arrived. For once, she didn't have a good answer to that one. She certainly didn't want to have to fight her way through his hordes of Grey-hood goons. She was a Detective, not a combat monster. She badly hoped, despite her own mixed feelings on the issues, that the Wrath would show up again as well.

Otherwise, everything rested rather over much on a few computer programmes and her natural ability to finagle her way out of a shit-storm.

"Well, Renee, you've got what you wanted." she murmured silently to herself. "A chance to put The Question to the Black Mask. What you going to do now?" she wondered.

She tapped gently on the pad in front of her, waiting for a number of complex programme to begin their long and difficult work. This operation was reckless even beyond her previously insane standards, but she had to know.

End of the line. Last stop on a long road that began several months ago with a drunken confession from Jim Corrigan and led all the way to her unforgiving and cruel interrogation of Rebecca Mulcahey. Saving Rebecca had been...something. A last paean to a now departed code of ethics, perhaps. A confession of guilt, an attempt to assuage a damaged conscience.

She didn't know, or really care. All that mattered was finishing what she had begun. Tonight, she was going to infiltrate the lair of Gotham's most well-armed and most paranoid crime lord.

She was going to corner him.

She was going to beat the shit out of him.

And she was finally going to know who sold out Jim Gordon, and put that ghost to rest.

Though her face was covered by her epidermic mask, her eyes watered a little beneath the protective artificial skin. She wasn't crying for herself, or even for her murdered boss. She didn't really know why she felt like crying. It wasn't fear, either.

Maybe it was a last hope that it wasn't going to end the way she felt it was.

"Last stop." she repeated again to herself. She tapped the tablet with her stylus, and waited.


	15. Chapter Fourteen, Knockout Punch

**Chapter Fourteen**

There had been a lot of shouting, of course, and commotion. Barbara had simply stood there, blinking, frozen in the moment, her fist extended, flesh rippling outwards, imagining everything in slow-motion. It had been a very good punch. James had fallen back like a doll, a huge bruise emerging on the side of his face. She had felt the corners of her scarred lips twitch, a manic grin of satisfaction on the cusp of dawning.

Barbara-Keane had been the first to start yelling, venting anger at the monster-child assaulting her darling Jimmy. Harry Barnes had tried to calm things, of course. Ray had simply suppressed a chuckle of his own, before gently gripping Barbara's shoulders and guiding her out of the dining room back into the porch.

She sat on the stairs, the two cats curling themselves around her feet. She dimly remembered them, and stroked them softly. They were Harry's cats, Theo and Potsdam. The logic behind their names had always evaded her. Why not Theo and Archibald, or Potsdam and Yalta, or some sort of theme that made sense? It was little things like this that distracted her mind, for the time being. She felt her heart hammering, her blood thundering. Why had she punched her brother?

_Because he deserved it._

Ray sat beside her, his instinct to light up a cigarette quelled by circumstance. He fumbled for something to do instead, checking his mobile phone to make sure it was still off. It was. Had it been on he might have seen a number of urgent text messages from Renee Montoya. But he didn't. So it was this crisis he was attending to, and not another.

"You ok, Babs?" he asked, because that was what you were supposed to do. The clamour and din of the next room and the family rallying around and muttering about things was starting to fade, as the brief drama was glossed over, in the way that such things tend to be, as extended families desperately focus on their own petty affairs, and the imminent prospect of a sumptuous Thanksgiving supper. The wafting smell of roast potatoes, stuffing, and a well-glazed turkey quickly put an end to most ruminations on the Incident.

Babs simply sat on the stairs, stroking Potsdam and Theo. She was more of a dog person, she knew, and Fang would probably not be too happy to smell cat on her later. But for now it was nice to reconnect with something from her childhood that didn't feel like betrayal.

"He's always been a bit of a shit-head, your brother." he tried, baldly going for the direct approach. "I mean, all that Goth stuff, and what-not. What's that about? Kids eh?"

She turned to look at him, her face a mask of perfect control and composure. "Am I..different now?" she struggled to find the words, ghosts rising from the depths of her mind. "Did...I do that, or did he make me?"

Ray didn't have to ask who "he" was. He offered a comforting pat on the back, unsure exactly how to approach this confused, troubled young woman. He had figured she'd probably have to deal with some emotions like this, but he'd never been a parent, he had no idea how to deal with this young girl, how to reach out, or even whether he should.

But one thing that had seemed to work with her was...well, not treating her like a teenager or a child. It still seemed painfully weird and counter-intuitive, but he tried to imagine what he would do if Barbara was Renee Montoya, or someone like that. A fellow partner in crime, a detective dealing with their own issues, be it the loss of a loved one or the simple mind-numbing horror of what humans do to each other on a nightly basis.

"You can't ever doubt yourself, Babs. You can have regrets and god knows there's plenty of booze in the world to help you drown those, but you can't ever have doubt in the moment. You have to have faith in your own judgement. The only thing worse than a Detective who makes a guess that's wrong is a Detective who doesn't make a guess at all. You have to be confident that everything you do is for the best." He said, squeezing her shoulder reassuringly.

Babs face didn't change an inch, but a minuscule amount of tension flowed out of her body. "What about the...rest of it, I guess?"

"Hell if I know. They can't begin to understand. It's a lonely life, being a cop. They can't know what its really like out there, and you shouldn't try too hard to make them understand. That's your gift to them, and to your own peace of mind. There's some things you're really better off knowing, when you're like them." his gaze didn't leave her face, wondering if this was remotely the right pep talk to be giving her, but as crazy as it all seemed, it seemed to resonate with her more than any other type of talk he or anyone else had tried to give her.

Which was several kinds of fucked up when you stopped to think about it. Where the hell had this sense of being a grizzled street-monster come from? He could sort of unpick the logic of some of her problems, but simply blaming everything on Joker poison was overly simplistic even for him.

"Did your dad ever come into this house?" he asked, changing the subject, startling her.

"No, he always waited in the car outside. I always assumed it was because he was in a hurry, but...now I think its because he was afraid."

"What makes you say that?" he asked, though he suspected he already knew the answer. But he had to get her to say it out loud, for her self.

"Because I'm afraid, Ray. I'm so afraid. And seeing him...it made me so angry. He didn't even say anything, but somehow, deep down, I knew, knew that I needed to hit him. That he deserved it." She said the words, but there was no emotion in them. It was like she was reading a script, someone else's dialogue. These are the things you're supposed to say.

Ray nodded, accepting her response at face value. Emotional depth had never been his strong point, and he was anxious to get this resolved, to see his charge feel better. The last thing he wanted was for her to have to be rushed out of her family's home because of a panic attack, especially on a busy evening like this.

He had a feeling Patricia would completely drop everything to help Babs if he asked her, though. Another emotional tinder-box, that woman, something he was only dimly beginning to perceive.

Harry Barnes came back out, looking completely haggard. "It's...ah...ok. We put some ice on and everything. Margaret came in and she...she says she'd be happy to sit with Babs, and make sure she eats fine. I don't think, well, that is to say..."

"It's ok, Harry. I don't really want to sit with them either." she cut across his awkward disseminating. Harry had always tried to play the nice guy, and probably felt just as badly about her situation as anyone did. But it was also clear he had his own priorities, his own life with Barbara-Keane, and for whatever reason Bab's mother seemed to favour Jim Jr right now. Punching him wasn't exactly an endearing action, but the coldness had been there before, and this was a quick-exit from having to deal with that.

Babs couldn't be a hundred per cent sure that hadn't been her motivation all along. Maybe she ought to start using violence to solve more of her problems, she thought idly. Something in her grinned at the thought.

"Ok, that's good. Margaret's setting up a little space in the Living Room. Uh, you can sit with us if you want Detective..."

"No, that's fine. I'll go with Babs. Hell, Barbara's probably still mad at me for the time I let Jim drive home drunk." he forced a chuckle, trying to warm the mood up. Harry seemed quite pathetically grateful. Wills simply shrugged. It wasn't to make the dean's life any easier with his wife. He genuinely found Barbara-Keane quite a cold bitch. Though, she had been warm enough, once, but years of marriage to someone who was not only a senior detective but also living a double-life was, well, trying to say the least.

Babs bid the cats good-bye, and followed Ray and Harry through into the Living Room, where a small table had been set up. She was surprised to see her step-mother there, indeed, surprised that she had stepped up to provide this...social compromise. She grimaced. For the first time she actually began to think about what the rest of the family thought of her, and probably assumed based on her action.

She told herself she didn't really care. But she was curious about why Margaret was here, out of all of them. A guilty-streak, perhaps? Or, she thought more cynically, a desire not to be in the same room as a family predominantly composed of people who were related to the man who married her dead husband's first wife?

It wasn't only herself who had to deal with a complex family arrangement, she figured. Though she couldn't muster any real sympathy for Margaret's own feelings or difficulties in this situation.

"Babs! Please, sit down. We'll have some food brought in in a moment." Margaret said, with a degree of joviality. Her face was tight, her eyes hollow. It seemed she also had lost a lot of weight in the past year. Her hair was turning grey at the roots too. She gestured to the seats. "Ray, good to see you again too. Sorry, I've been helping with the cooking, or I'd have come to greet you in person."

A partial-lie, Babs suspected. More likely she had been helping with the cooking to keep out of their way. But dealing with this...woman would be easier than dealing with a whole room full of people looking at her and judging her. Here she only had to remain impassive, and remind herself of her new-found strength.

Nothing Margaret could say would penetrate the wall she had built and reinforced deep within her self, she knew.

As they sat down, Raymond looked around nervously, aware that the tension in the room was thick enough to cut with a knife. He adjusted himself in his seat, and adjusted the place-mat in front of him nervously. The din in the dining room and kitchen was muted out here. The room was mood-lit, curtains covering the big front-windows that gazed out on to the darkened suburbs outside.

Thankfully, there was no clock in this room, or he would have found himself glancing at it over and over.

Margaret took a deep breath, and seemed to let go of a burden that had been resting on her shoulders. "Alright, Babs. I guess I might as well just...come out and say it, dear. I'm sorry."

The silence deepened. Bab's eyes grew tight at the plunged ahead, determined to give voice to something that had been bothering her for a long time.

"I'm sorry I let that asshole Wayne talk me into staying away for so long. I'm sorry I didn't do more to visit you. I'm sorry you had to meet your brother and mother again in circumstances like that." she took a deep breath, and gripped the table, steadying herself.

"I don't expect you to forgive me, but..."She continued, expecting anger or frustration or accusations.

"Wait. What's that about Wayne?" Babs sputtered, the anger she had been building and stoking within herself suddenly re-routed along an entirely unexpected hadn't known quite what to expect, but this deflection into new territory unsettled her.

Margaret looked at her, confusion and alarm warring with her face. Even Ray looked surprised.

"I think there's been a misunderstanding..." he said slowly, filling an agonised silence with a statement of the looked back and forth between the two, both looking torn and confused. They really are a lot like, he mused. No wonder Babs had gotten on so well with her after the divorce, before...all this.

Babs simply growled. "Explain everything. Now."

Margaret sighed, but before she could continue Harry came in with some plates, loaded with food. "Uh..here's your uh, food. Maybe...maybe after supper, tempers will be cooler and you can uh, come back in, and stuff." Harry mumbled. Two withering glances melted him on the spot.

Babs took her fork, and held it like a dagger in her hand. Harry Barnes quickly retreated, and Ray smiled wryly. Of the many men who had influenced Babs life, as surrogate fathers, brothers, guardians and wards, Harry was by far the most useless and also perhaps the most harmless. He was secretly glad the man was such a wet blanket. The last thing the family needed was another Jim Gordon.

As they began to eat, Margaret reluctantly began to talk.

"I'm...not sure where to begin..."

* * *

Black Mask had begun to settle in, his nerves calming, as the eighth truck rolled in without a hitch. The night was going according well, they had off-loaded most of the cocaine smoothly and immediately begun re-filling the trucks with legitimate goods to send them on into the city to sell in small convenience stores around the city in time for Black Friday.

He grinned to himself, loving it when you could get paid twice for the same job. The cocaine would be distributed in smaller packets once it had been weighed, counted and tested, and there'd be enough coke to keep Gotham's addicts in the snow until spring rolled around.

He moved to the fridge-safe, where the highest quality stuff would be kept refrigerated for later. He was thirsty, and had been keeping a bottle of a fine claret red on ice to celebrate if everything went well tonight. No sign of the Wrath yet, but successful business was successful business.

"Go get Hans and Bakker up from the unloading floor. I think we're probably going to have a quiet night." he ordered, as he settled in, pulling out a glass and the ice-bucket with the wine. It might be a little premature yet to celebrate, but you could get ready.

"Riddle me this boys, whose green, useless and a complete dunce?" he chuckled to himself, as he popped the cork and prepared to pour the chilled wine. It was a little low-grade by his usual tastes, and the wine snob in him was offended at such a slap-dash way of storing and consuming wine, but needs must when devils drive.

"A toast, to another year of profits for Sionis Industries." he grinned, raising the glass to himself.

He was about to take a sip, his eyes away from the monitors as the tenth truck began to roll in, when all hell broke loose.

* * *

The next few minutes were some of the most heart-pounding of Renee's life. She had practised what she was going to do over and over in her head, but the margins for error were almost non-existent. It was a ballsy plan, almost suicidally reckless, and relied a fair bit on video-game logic to succeed. Unlike a video-game, there were no saved games she could re-load if she got any part of this wrong.

Her truck came to a stop, and she held her breath, counting out seconds in her head. She slapped the side of her tablet, and breathed a sigh of relief as a connection was made. She quickly activated her Wi-Fi cracker, whilst she focused on the next part of her plan. She slunk down next to the emergency underside hatch, removing it quickly and dropping below the truck, hoping they were sloppy enough now not to be routinely checking undersides with proper torches. The smell of diesel and electricity almost made her gag, as she fell flat onto the hard gravel, a mess of wires and fuel-lines above her. Just in time, as the grey-hoods threw open the truck doors, torches blazing inside as they hurried in to remove the packing crates.

Ignoring the pain and her discomfort, she tucked the tablet away in a pocket, producing a road-flare from the other, and rolled out towards the darker side, hoping against hope the shadows would hide her from any guards still watching the truck that closely.

She kept rolling till she was by a crate, and awkwardly crouch-ran behind it. She took just a second to assess her surroundings, making sure no-one had spotted her or was about to do so, before she turned her eyes away, and pulled the road-flare in the general direction of the truck she had just exited.

The explosion of light and heat still almost blinded her, as it rocketed across the few feet before exploding in a mess of sparks and leaking diesel fumes. The explosion that followed -that- was quite spectacular, as cocaine and leather-goods quickly ignited and fed into the flames.

She quickly dashed away from the blazing column behind her, vanishing into the gloom of one of the loading bays, just as several guys ran past her, their eyes focused on the blazing disaster now occurring in the middle of the truck-yard.

Immediately fire-alarms began to ring, and she took a few seconds to pull her tablet out. Encryption cracked. The Black Mask was getting sloppy with his digital security, it seemed. Then again he had always been an old-fashioned type of crook. Long overdue for being taken down a few pegs.

She activated her Trojan, and scrambled his security feeds, as well as beginning a self-replicating executable that would crash the network by copying itself twice and opening itself each time. Simple, crude stuff, but effective. She had more sophisticated toys saved for later.

Chaos reigned as she slipped through the shadows, and she pulled down her night-vision goggles, as she glided swiftly and silently between crates, evading notice by a hair's breadth. She tried to remember the blue-prints she had struggled to commit to memory earlier. Where was she? She looked around, trying to get her bearings.

The flames were roaring high as henchmen rushed to put out the fire, whilst others became fully-alert, scanning the perimeter. Black Mask began barking orders frantically over his walkie-talkie. She wished she had some way to jam those comms, but she could only bring so much.

Slipping over to the side, she quickly spied a fuse-box, hopefully connected to the main power-lines for this place. She quickly tore the box open, and got out a spray-bottle full of fast-acting acid. Corrosive stuff. You never knew when it might come in handy. She quickly ruined the fuses, and hurried on, letting the acid eat away, as she threw herself flat, another group of men running past. She needed to find a way up to Black Mask's office before order was restored. Too many men, too many guns. She was bound to be found eventually. She just needed more time.

As the electricity began to spark and short and the lights flickered, she took her chance. She ran for the stairs, pushing herself to her limits, ignoring all distractions, her adrenaline thundering in her ears.

A shout was given. She'd been spotted. Gun-fire began to rake the air around her. She didn't have time to fish out her side-arm and return fire. She was at a disadvantage, running up steps, giving them momentary hesitation to better aim. She leapt up the remaining steps, bullets ripping through her coat. Her lungs and muscles burned, but she didn't care.

Only a few more steps.

The lights failed completely, bathing the warehouse in darkness. A cry of fear rose up. Apparently word had been spread that this was usually a precursor to an attack by the Wrath. The flicker of the spectacular flare-fire in the gutted truck shone through the windows, casting eerie dancing shadows everywhere.

Men crouched low, checking their weapons, momentarily disorientated. Black Mask made a key mistake.

He came out of his office, his rifle in hand, to shout at his men in person. "Don't just sta-" he began, but she was already running at him. He turned, flicking the safety off, his grinning death's head betraying no emotion.

The Faceless and the Face of Death.

He fired.

She leapt.


	16. Chapter Fifteen, Black Friday

**Chapter Fifteen**

The Question crashed into her quarry, bringing him to the ground, his carbine bucking up and away from his body. The sound of the gun-fire was near-deafening, and she felt a stray shell-casing leave a painful scorch mark across her epidermic mask, eroding it a little, exposing her natural skin beneath.

But the pain in her cheek was but one of a thousand signals her body was desperately sending to her body. In the span of a few heart-beats, she was pinning the Black Mask, and becoming aware of her dire situation.

He had hit her above the shoulder, near the neck, rupturing muscles and tendons. Her right arm was now functionally useless, tingling and cold, as blood began to well up. The bullet had gone straight through, and she could only hope that it hadn't hit anything too important. Her heart was pumping in over-drive. She forced herself to calmness, remembering techniques she had spent months practising after the death of Jim Gordon to help her deal with her rage.

Her body worked on automatic, nonetheless. She slammed her left fist into Black Mask's solar plexus, driving the wind from him, before grabbing his mask and tugging fiercely. He screamed in pain, but it didn't come off.

She didn't have time for this. There were men coming for her, now, converging on her position. Dozens of well-armed men. The darkness had bought her a few seconds, and all of those seconds were now up.

She hauled the Black Mask up, striking his nerve-clusters in his arms and chest to keep him reeling from agonising pain, unable to do much. She swept herself behind him, ignoring her own agony as she forced her stiff right hand to work, to clutch down on Black Mask's shoulder with a death-grip. Her nerves were sluggish, but responsive. Good. Arm might heal if get to doctor soon, she thought.

By the time she was forcing Black Mask back into his office, her brain had run through a million things, and barely eight seconds had passed. Eight seconds too many, she knew. Gun-fire began to ricochet through the office, windows shattering and spraying glass everywhere.

She threw herself and her prisoner to the ground. "You idiots! Stop shooting!" he coughed, trying to shout.

She held him fast, even as he tried to squirm free. "You are going to tell me everything I want, Mask, or I'm letting your trigger-happy henchmen kill you." she whispered close to his ear.

He wheezed at that. "You're trying to interrogate me? How fucking stupid a bitch are you? Even if you kill me you can't possibly escape this warehouse."

She gritted her teeth. The pain from her gun-shot wound was catching up to her as her adrenaline levels began to ebb. She had to incapacitate Black Mask, dress her wound, pass out for a few hours, or better yet find a crooked shrink. But she couldn't do any of that. And now she was stuck in this office, as more and more henchmen converged on this position.

She threw Black Mask against a wall, stamping hard down on his leg so it twisted badly. "Aaaaagh!" he screamed, as his leg made a painful crunching noise.

"I don't have time for fancy techniques. Answer my question and I won't make your time with me a short but extremely painful one." She husked, coughing, feeling short of breath. Dizzy. Thinking becoming impaired. Not good.

"Release the Boss or we'll machine-gun the whole room!" a thug yelled out. "You're completely surrounded!"

"Shut up or I kill him, and you all lose your pay-checks!" she shouted back, rapidly losing patience. Time. She needed more time. But it was trickling away, like blood from her shoulder.

Black Mask began to laugh wheezily, even as he gripped at his throbbing, twisted leg. "You fucking psycho cunt. You have no idea what you're...hahaha...getting yourself into..."

She tipped the desk over, and threw some boxes and furniture in front of the door. A temporary measure. She worked frantically, barricading herself in. She wasn't thinking straight. She was trapping herself in here. The windows were broken. Second story window. Could jump out.

"Tell me who sold James Gordon out. How did they get him? How did they nab Barbara? What did you pass on to the Joker?" she yelled back, ignoring his insults. She didn't dare slow down, even as blood was now soaking deep into her sleeve, running down her arm with little drips. She grabbed an old oil-cloth, spitting on it, and quickly began furnishing a tourniquet. It was hard to do one-handed, and she fumbled a few times. She was starting to shake.

She needed more Time.

"Ahaha! That's what this is all about for you? You dumb whore. You think I knew what was going on in that psycho clown's head? You and that Wrath-guy have killed everyone who connected me to that operation. Thanks for that by the way. Tidying up all my loose ends for me." He started to chuckle, but she crossed the distance, breaking the wine-bottle he'd been drinking from carefully, before shoving the jagged end up against his eye, making him flinch. "Eye-holes in a Mask? Not a good idea. You should go Faceless, like me." she husked at him. "Answer my...ah...fucking question, or you can be the Blind Mask too."

He stared at her, and something in his hard-eyes changed. He was finally taking her seriously. He grew cold with hatred and malice.

"You'll be dead in a minute, so why not? You want to know what happened?" He leaned close, and she blinked, trying to keep a clear head.

"You sold yourselves out, bitch. Some-one high up- way high up- gave us the encryption on your radios. The Joker was listening in on you for weeks. He knew everything. We hardly needed any moles. I wish I knew who, really I do. You changed the encryption the day after and I've had to really work to corrupt you ever since." He chuckled.

"I wonder who you are, Faceless. A detective, perhaps..."

She dropped the broken wine-bottle, and slammed his head against the wall, the Iron Mask cracking the paintwork as she did so, and cracking his head inside too, knocking him out.

She pulled herself up grimly. They would be coming soon. Her vision was getting blurry. Her legs felt unsteady. She pinched herself, trying to keep herself awake through pain. Not that she wasn't already in incredible pain. Her whole right-arm was beginning to throb, feeling like pins and needles were stabbing her repeatedly. She took a deep breath, and pulled out her tablet, crouching low behind the over-turned table. She activated the last programme, uploading a worm that would copy everything from Black Mask's private servers to a proxy server, which would then send the rest on to a dozen dummy accounts across the world, before ending up, by a very convoluted path, in the in-boxes of the top agents of the ATF, DEA, FBI and GCPD all investigating the Black Mask's operations.

It was the last thing she could do, she knew. Closing the loop. She breathed slowly, trying not to hyperventilate. Time to go.

She leapt out the window behind her, gliding through the darkness as she fell into the storage yard beyond. A handful of thugs were waiting, spaced twenty yards apart, their guns trained on her.

Her last seconds ebbed away. She readied herself for a crouch-roll, but her shoulder cramped at the last moment. She fell badly, knocking the wind out of herself.

Not that it mattered. They trained their guns on her, walking up to her shivering body slowly, grinning to themselves.

They fired. And fired again.

* * *

Harv Bullock was asleep when his smart-phone began to buzz. He groaned drearily, rolling over, much to the annoyance of the hooker who was currently occupying the bed with him. She mumbled angrily, pushing the overweight man.

"Phone." she mumbled angrily, her own sleep disturbed, wincing. Harv was one of the few clients who paid for her to stay the night, and as much as she found him somewhat gross she valued any time that gave her a chance to get some shut-eye.

Having that disturbed was going to cost extra she sleepily thought to herself.

He continued to moan, his joints creaking, as he forced himself awake. He was way too old for this shit. He yawned mightily, before reaching for the phone, slapping it clumsily, so that it fell onto the floor, getting lost amongst discarded clothes, condom-wrappers and empty beer-cans.

"Fuck...shit...fuck..." he cursed, fumbling around. He bent over, his joints screaming in protest. He finally picked it up, cursing, thumbing the unlock option, and blearily trying to focus on the screen, reading the message.

He froze, blinking. Seconds passed as he tried to resolve what he was reading. What the fuck..?

"Renee." He knew, intuitively. He felt something stirring deep in his stomach. Anxiety. Panic. Was this..? What?

Sleep-fog evaporated in his brain. He quickly dialled the emergency responder number.

"Hey, Dispatch. It's Bullock. SNI 54567. I need you to send all available units for an 11-99 at 45 Tangier Street in Crime Alley. Code Purple. Do it now!" he barked, aware of how unusual this was, but feeling a deep, uncomfortable feeling building in his gut.

Oh god, Renee. What have you got yourself into? He thought.

"Roger that 54567. APB is being issued now. First priority Code 3 response for an 11-99 at 45 Tangier street." She replied crisply. He sighed with relief, but found his hand now shaking. He quickly thanked her and hung up. He was still sat on the bed, naked.

"Are you coming back to bed?" mumbled the prostitute. What was her name again? Irene or something? It didn't matter now. He shook, as he read through the rest of what was still coming in on his smart-phone. He responded with a grunt, too absorbed to reply in words.

What had she found? What had she been doing? He blanched as he saw an audio-recording was attached. He debated with himself for a moment before he hit play.

""_Tell me who sold James Gordon out. How did they get him? How did they nab Barbara? What did you pass on to the Joker?"_ a gravelly voice, female, indistinct, hard to make out. The quality of the recording was poor, and there were a number of other background sounds that echoed harshly.

Irene groaned, stuffing a pillow against her head.

"_You sold yourselves out, bitch. Some-one high up- way high up- gave us the encryption on your radios. The Joker was listening in on you for weeks. He knew everything. We hardly needed any moles. I wish I knew who, really I do. You changed the encryption the day after and I've had to really work to corrupt you ever since." _

The recording cut out. But the male voice sounded familiar. Harsh, but refined. Cold. If he had to guess, he'd say it was the Black Mask. If what he said was true... he checked his e-mails again, his heart pounding. All the others seemed to be cc'd. But he alone had gotten this recording.

He had a nasty feeling he knew where it had come from, and why.

"I'm going into work. There's money on the table." he said, producing more angry grunts from Irene. He didn't care. He needed to get dressed. He started to fish around for his pants and shirt.

He barely glanced at the clock. Just past midnight. Black Friday. He thought grimly. Within minutes he was dressed and heading out the door. He checked his side-arm was still secure in his pocket. Bad practice to wear it around whores, but he didn't trust anyone now, not after this.

He got out his smart-phone, and started to make calls. First he tried to reach Renee, no response. Then he tried Ray.

He left a message on the answer-phone, but it was hardly necessary.

He got in his car, and floored the accelerator, as he headed for 45 Tangier Street. To hell with protocol, to hell with back-up. He didn't know what he was getting himself into, how many there were, or even if it was definitely Montoya.

But he wasn't going to take the chance otherwise. He'd let down Jim once. He wasn't going to ever let that happen again. Not this time.

He sped away into the cold night.

* * *

Barbara ate her food slowly, listening as Margaret explained things. It was difficult for her to focus, as her emotions ran riot. She tried to concentrate on the food, swallowing small bites of meat and potato, knowing she needed to eat, but feeling butterflies in her stomach.

Ray ate even less, watching proceedings nervously. Margaret Gordon seemed to be unburdening herself. In a way, her approach was even bolder than Ray's. She simply laid out the facts as she knew them, and let Barbara decide for herself. Given that it wasn't all that long ago that Margaret had been grounding Babs to stop her trying to go out with boys, or get into trouble by hanging around with the "cool kid" gangs, it was surprising that she was now electing to treat Babs like a full adult, when so many others had struggled to see her as anything other than a kid. A messed up kid, maybe, but a kid still nonetheless.

The Detective found it a difficult strategy. He wasn't sure that Babs really was that mature yet, for all that she had made considerable progress. But was she really recovering, he now wondered, or was she simply burying her pain like a land-mine, which could explode again at any-time?

Margaret for her part, simply seemed to be relieved to finally be explaining things to her step-daughter. She seemed to deeply care for Babs, despite everything, and Ray could see the deep pain and guilt etched into that worn face. He couldn't begin to imagine what had induced her to leave Babs along for so long.

"I think...I think we all made mistakes. Maybe unforgivable ones. I can't...I can't excuse what we did. But I want you to understand, Babs, that I never stopped loving you. I never stopped caring. I don't think any of us did, or ever have." She paused, drinking some water shakily.

Babs just sat there, a rock of silence, her face carved like granite. It was all simply too much. She couldn't begin to process all of this, let alone respond to it. It was all too much. She had to shut down, she had to do...something. She couldn't deal, she just couldn't.

Yet she sat paralysed, unable to move, unable to react. It took all her effort not to explode from the pressure. She continued to eat mechanically, chewing each tiny chunk rhythmically a hundred times.

Margaret coughed uneasily, and reluctantly continued, unsure how to engage with her estranged step-daughter, knowing it was unfair but needing also to just say -something-, to break the silence that had existed for months and now threatened to engulf their proceedings once again.

"Wayne saw how difficult things were for us in those few weeks. I never really understood his relationship with...with your father. Not until then. He saw how much we were suffering, and he promised to help get you the very best care. The very best. The city was offering to pay for a carer too, of course, it was the least they felt they could do after...after everything. But we were torn apart, divided, fighting amongst ourselves and...we just didn't know how to handle what had become of you. Tragedy is supposed to bring families together but..." she sighed sadly. "We fell apart. Wayne's offer was...too tempting. An opportunity to just...put things on hold, sort ourselves out. I thought it would be for only a few weeks at most. I knew it was wrong, but I wanted to believe it would help you. We all did."

She clenched her fists tightly, fighting back tears. "Babs, please. We wanted what was best for you, we really did. We should of...we should of come to you sooner."

Babs couldn't help it any longer. She was strong now, she knew, stronger and harder, but the walls were still too new, too fresh.

She started to laugh. Her eyes took on a weird cast, and she could see the alarm in their faces.

"Babs..." Ray began, rising from his street. She put out a hand. She stopped laughing.

"You're a liar. You didn't want was best for me. You just...just...wanted to be away from a Monster!" she hissed. "You didn't care. You saw the grin and you saw the Joker and you saw how he killed my father and you didn't care, you didn't care, you just turned away because because my hands had his blood and and..." she swallowed, barely able to go on. Memories exploded inside of her, dark flashes.

She rose from the table, shaking violently. "I wanted to be alone. I needed to be alone. But you abandoned me. All of you. You fucking...you... how could you ever have been worthy of my father?" she screamed. "How could you ever have thought for one moment he'd leave me? Or any of you? He saved this whole fucking miserable city, and this is how you repay him? How you...help me?"

She stormed off, running from the table, tears welling in her eyes. It was almost a normal reaction, she knew. Anyone would be angry, anyone would be upset in these circumstances. But the worst part, the part that destroyed her, was knowing they might be right. That she was a monster, deep down. That she deserved to be left alone.

Margaret made to follow, her eyes wide with concern. Ray stopped her. "Leave it to me." he said gruffly. She flinched, but a hard look restrained her.

For better or for worse, Ray really was her parent now. Maybe some-day Margaret could re-enter her life. But now was not the time. There was a long road to be tread before that gap could even begin to be crossed.

She howled inside, fleeing all the way outside to the black cold, feeling the harsh winds caress her skin as she stood outside on the porch. She shivered, letting the cold and blackness consume her, slumping to her knees. She wanted to cry, she really did. But the tears came slowly, little droplets when she wanted to force all the sadness out.

Something held it back. Something dark still crouching in her mind, in her heart. A part of her, she knew, a monstrous part. Did the Joker put it there, or did he merely bring it out? A part that laughed at her weakness, at her pain, at her stupidity, at everything. A part that made her think about the same things over and over, tormenting her with repetition of barely comprehensible flashes.

She saw herself in the dress. She saw the tea-party. She saw his grinning, ever-grinning face. She saw her own face. She saw her hands, covered in blood so dark it was black. She saw figures running, too blurry to make out.

She saw herself in the hospital mirror, pale as death, her hair like red worms. She saw her teeth, yellow and worn. She saw it all, over and over.

She was holding herself so tightly it was beginning to hurt. She dug her nails into her arms, trying to draw blood by scratching them. Shaking like a leaf, from anguish and the bitter cold, she barely noticed when Ray put his jacket over her, coming to sit down by her.

"Here we are again, on the Porch." he grunted. "Outside this time. Kinda cold out here isn't it?" he babbled.

She glanced at him, her eyes red and rimey. Why was crying so hard? She thought. Why did it take so much effort to force tears out?

Why didn't it help the ache in her heart?

"Why, Ray? I didn't ask for this. I didn't want to be a Monster. I didn't let them down...I...I didn't ask for this..."

He hugged her tightly, so tightly it made her gasp a little. He didn't have any words, he could never find the words. He wasn't a father or a husband or a hero. But he saw she was in pain, and simply acted on instinct.

His instincts had served him well as a detective, from time to time. Now he hoped they would help him be a human being.

She didn't say anything, she simply stared away into the darkness. He held her, stroking her hair softly. He could feel her warmth, feel her body shaking through the coat as he held her. It was an intimate moment.

No, he wasn't a father. But he was doing the best he could. Somehow or another, he hoped it would be enough to help save her.

She sighed, resting her head against his shoulder, letting him hold her. Letting herself float in the warmth, ignoring the cold and the darkness, if only for this moment.

After a while, he spoke. "Let's go inside. Or maybe go home, whichever you prefer."

She nodded, slowly. "I don't...I don't want to see them again."

He looked at her slowly. "I...understand. Want me to get the car?"

"Yes...yes please, Ray."

As he went to get the car, she sat on the porch, and stared out at the suburbs, feeling the wind through her hair, clutching his coat around her tightly. Whatever she was, whatever she had been, she could be something else. She had to be. Even if she was a monster, she wanted to fight that. Not for their sake, not for Gotham, but for her fathers. For those that could care. For those that did.

It was a cold night, but at some point the night would end. And in the twilight between darkness and dawn, she could hold to that thought.

**==END OF ACT ONE==**


	17. Interlude, Crime of the Century

**Interlude**

Edward Nygma waited, his legs crossed, his cane in his hand. He turned to his henchpeople. Query and Echo had just come in from some side corridors, paint-buckets and brushes in hand. He grinned.

"Done already? All of them? You work wonderfully fast my dears." He said, producing an ornate pocket-watch from his breast-pocket, flicking it open to look. "Precise to the second. Tempus really knew his stuff. Such a shame, really. He had a brilliant mind, but, ultimately, mine proved the superior, and Gotham only has room for one with vision like mine."

Query and Echo simply nodded passively, used to their employee's tendency to monologue to himself. They wore tight green jumpsuits and simple eye-masks, leaving their full-lipped faces mostly uncovered, and their curvy bodies fully on display. Not that anyone but Edward and the other henchmen were around to appreciate it this time.

"Well, we have a few more minutes yet. Honestly, I had expected an appearance by now." Edward got up off of what he had been sitting on. A rare antique wooden-chair from the 17th century, finely carved. Exquisite craftsmanship. Edward had already made his own mark with the tip of his cane, carving a question mark into the upholstery, for all to see.

Throughout Gotham's Museum of Art, henchmen were busily defacing every item they could, the security systems paralysed by a combination of hacking and sophisticated jamming devices provided by the Penguin. The night watchmen had been incapacitated easily with knockout gas and more direct knock-out blows, courtesy of his green-clad henchmen.

It was time Gotham knew exactly who they were dealing with, he reflected. The Oil Rig had always been a gamble. An expensive, powerful mystery to tantalise any crime-fighters, an unknown unknown, hinting at what was to come.

But here, in the heart of Gotham City, he sought to make a known unknown. His signature would be everywhere, and the guards when they awoke would remember green faceless henchmen or shapely jump-suited women. He had kept his face hidden, for now. In a Hall of Faces, he would be the Faceless One, unavoidable, ever-present, and totally incognito.

It was simply too delicious.

"Did you bring me the painting I asked for?"

Query nodded, and brought forth a shrouded canvas she had procured from the maximum security display. It hadn't been easy, but challenges were partly why they followed the Riddler. Ordinary crime had long since become boring to the two former-mercenaries. The Riddler's brilliance always provided them with some new challenge for their skill, something truly insane or impossible that he would leave it up to them to accomplish. He wasn't that bad looking either, and his other demands were easy enough to accommodate.

He gently approached the painting, removing the shroud with a breath of anticipation. Ah, here it was._ The Tempest_ by Giorgione, one of the most enigmatic and beautiful of the late Renaissance landscapes. It alone of the gallery had been spared the crude defacement he had ordered. And that was because he planned a much more sophisticated...re-working of this 500-year old masterpiece.

"Has my copy been skilfully substituted?"

"Yes, sir. Wasn't easy, even for us." Query replied stoically. An admission of difficulty spoke volumes for her. She prided herself on being the quiet one, and let Echo do most of the talking, usually.

He smiled. "Thank you, Query. That it is done is enough." An acknowledgement of gratitude also spoke volumes. Edward was rarely distracted from himself long enough to recognise the achievements of others. But tonight, there was a frisson in the air. Tonight, he could feel everything falling into place. Tonight, all Gotham would know a genius now walked among them.

He smiled to himself, before gently producing a very thin paintbrush and a tiny pot of black, thin oil-paint. He began, with care and precision, to paint his initials, E.N, in the bottom right hand corner of the iconic painting. He would do more work later, but he wanted to claim it for himself as soon as possible. All over the world art aficionados and critics would faint in horror when they found out what he had done, but what did they know?

Even Giorgione was inferior to the genius of Edward Nygma, and he would show everyone. There was nothing, not terrorism, not art, not science, not anything, that he could not excel at. But, of course, above and through all of that, there were the Riddles.

And so he had left, in big letters all over the Impressionists gallery this time, both his original riddle- in case it had been lost or the dunderheads had failed to find it- and a second one, to boast of his triumph and to provide hints of his next, even more grandiose caper.

Once he was finished, he packed the oil pot and brush away, and checked the pocket-watch he had obtained from dear, departed Temple Fugate. Yes, only a few more seconds now...

The arrow-hands passed the moment, and he frowned. He waited a few more seconds, and then a few more. He started to sweat, agitated. He shook the damn pocket-watch.

"Query, Echo. You are sure everything has gone as instructed?"

"Of course, sir." They answered in unison.

He began to sweat. His plan. Had something gone wrong? Had he made a mistake? Impossible. It was perfect to the last detail. He was the Riddler. No, no...it was their fault. Too stupid, too blind, too consumed by their own petty lives. That was it. They were late because he had over-estimated their capacity for intelligence.

He sighed with deep disappointment. He had been so looking forward to meeting his arch-nemesis for the first time. But if this...Wrath had not noted his clues, carefully seeded online and in a hundred other public places by now, then perhaps this brutish vigilante was not the true heir of the Dark Knight after all. He briefly considered the other one Black Mask had mentioned. The Question. She seemed much more along his lines, but he suspected she would meet her fate soon enough in another way.

No, there had to be another. Someone who could combine the traits of both, and give Edward the worthy challenge he craved. How could anyone truly appreciate the level of his brilliance, if they did not see the enemies he crushed, unmasked, exposed, humiliated to all the world before him?

He sighed, re-covering the canvas, and nodding to Query, who quickly moved forward to pick it up carefully. The boss did not like to carry things he didn't need to.

He began to walk out of the main lobby, question-marks gouged or painted or marked into every exhibit, even the replicas and the maps of the museum, a huge question-mark gouged into the middle of the graphic for the main lobby. No one could possibly mistake the scale of his act of art vandalism, the greatest crime of the century.

They headed for the huge doors, out into the cold November night. The other henchmen would follow soon, escaping by carefully planned routes, passing vehicles which would stop only for a few seconds at a time. The intricacy of the timing and the planning was in part, Fugate's work. He and the time-obsessed lawyer had collaborated in the early days, when they had both found a common bond in frustration with the way Gotham was, and a desire to turn their obsessions to grander things.

Edward would never admit anything less than sole credit for this work, of course. But, he admitted to himself, cheating like that was only a further mark of his brilliance. Edison had done no less when he had taken the work of the fool Nikola Tesla, and sold it as his own. Nikola would have squandered his gifts, giving them away for free. Edison was the smarter man, for he saw the power and the fame that such brilliance could bring.

He stood for a moment, feeling a cold wind ruffle his suit, and looked up, back towards the Art Museum, its lights dimly shining, the full extent of his work hidden for now till the morning. Black Friday would bring many surprises for Gotham this year.

A Black shadow stood high on the roof of the Art Galley, a long cape rippling out behind it in the wind.

Time seemed to freeze. He swallowed.

"Echo-" he began, and the shadow leapt, shining claws extended like a dark bird of prey, or a vengeful fury come to claim a sinner.

Nygma rolled to the side, and the Wrath landed with a powerful thud where the Riddler had been standing. Sweat began to bead on his brow. This wasn't going according to plan-

Echo and Query immediately drew their shoulder-slung carbines, and began firing at the Wrath. Bullets sparked and pinged as they shredded his cape and made painful dents in his armour. The only noise the hugely muscular masked figure made was a grunt of pain. He swept his clawed-gauntlets out in front of him as a make-shift shield, and he ran at them, his claws covering his face-mask.

Their guns ran out of ammo , and they both dived as Edward had, drawing their Exclamation-mark blades as they did so, mirroring one another with smooth and well-practised combat moves.

Other henchmen came hurrying out, small-arms at the ready.

Edward looked at his two henchwoman, and for one tiny moment he seemed to hesitate. Echo held his eyes. "Go. We can handle this." she said.

His hesitation immediately vanished, his brief moment of concern quickly washed away by pragmatic self-preservation, and an unacknowledged irritation and shame at himself for having ever hesitated even for a moment. The henchmen quickly covered his retreat, gun-fire echoing across the plaza in front of the Art Gallery. This was far too public, police would be drawn here in moments. It was Fugate's fault, his plans never had sufficient contingency-planning, he felt. Everything had to be like clock-work. All it took was one uncontrolled element, one wild spark, one rogue like this Wrath, and the whole plan was shot through.

He scrambled into the back of a getaway van, and hammered frantically on the side. "Go, go go! I'm in! Don't wait for the others you fool!" he shouted, and with a squeal of tires the van raced off, screaming down the roads and onto the main Highway through Gotham.

* * *

Echo and Query panted, their arms quivering, as they circled and made probing attacks on the Wrath. But despite being outnumbered he vastly outmatched them, unconcerned with gun-fire and able seemingly to parry their attacks with both lightning speed and punishing strength.

"You wanted attention,, and this is what you do with it?" The Wrath finally spoke, a husky voice, powerful and full of arrogant contempt. "You are a distraction, all of you, from the Vengeance that truly matters."

He focused on Echo, since she was marginally closer, and then leapt forward with a surge of energy, a hiss of something being released. Echo swore he seemed to get stronger and faster, as his claws swept her blade out of her hand, the other slamming her across the plaza with a sickening crunch.

"Echo!" Query yelled, dashing forward. The Wrath turned, his blades flashing. She screamed, furious, worried for her best friend and life-partner.

She battered the vigilante furiously with her blade, raining blows down on his claws, her eyes alight with fury. He recoiled for a few moments, but it soon pierced her mental fog that he was toying with her.

"You want to see real fury? You want to see my Wrath?" he roared, an actual, ear-splitting roar. It was terrifying, and her blows dimmed for a moment. He smashed her blade in two, and drew his huge, powerful claws back to eviscerate her.

Until a thundering sound distracted him. A henchman, easily six foot tall, was running across the plaza at him, ripping his green jump-suit free, revealing an impressively muscled chest, one that was criss-crossed in scars.

Victor Zsasz had arrived. A maniacal grin was on his face, and he had a long, serrated knife in one hand. "Nice claws. Maybe you'd like to see my little knife!" he yelled.

Query quickly back-flipped out of the way, as the Wrath bulldozed past where she had been to meet with Zsasz, two powerful juggernauts colliding head-on. She quickly hot-footed over to where Echo was, cradling her partners head. She was bleeding heavily, but scalp-wounds always looked messy. "Are you ok? How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Just one, bitch." she joked wearily. Query smiled, and then frowned. The fight occurring in the middle of the plaza now was audible even from here. Zsasz's blade screeched as it locked with the claws, but it did not break. He reached across and grabbed the Wrath by the throat, his meaty fingers choking the life from the caped vigilante.

"Fuckin' puny bird. You call those wings?" he sneered, indicating the eagle-like W symbol on the Wrath's chest.

The Wrath simply glared at him, before withdrawing his hands from his claws in a rapid motion, letting them and the knife drop to the ground with a clatter, throwing both hands up and around Victor's own throat, before head-butting him, echoing a move the Black Mask had used on him.

Victor recoiled, his vision dazed, his thinking blurry, blood starting to flow slightly from where the heavy mask had slammed into his powerful brow. But unlike Echo, he wasn't down for the count. He grinned. "I like this. Killing you might actually be fun."

He slammed his fist into the Wrath's gut with all his strength, his knuckles breaking and shock-waves travelling up his arm, but he didn't care. His whole body was -alive- with that special Miraclo stuff that the Riddler had managed to get for him. He wasn't just on the regular stuff, oh no, this was -Venom-, military grade performance enhancers. He loved it.

What he didn't realise was that the Wrath was also on the same substance. The dark knight-wannabe threw his arms around Victor, giving him a painful bear-hug, tight and hard enough for Victor to gasp, feeling a rib crack and break.

He kicked out, a powerful, muscled leg slamming upwards into the Wrath's groin, as he rolled away, gasping. The Wrath staggered, fazed by the assault, but not greatly harmed. He glared at the serial killer.

"Killing you would not be Vengeance. But it would certainly be Justice." his voice seemed to change a little on that last word. "Funny." he seemed to laugh at a private in-joke.

Whilst Victor and the vigilante grappled, Query carried Echo to safety. Other henchmen had quickly given up trying to get a pot-shot at the figure, who seemed to be mostly impervious to bullets anyway. She glared at the nearest one, and quickly loaded the injured hench-woman into the back of one of the last remaining get-away vehicles.

"Get us out of here. We're done here. Fuck the rest." she growled. Echo simply smiled drearily. "Looks like I'm the quiet one tonight." she said, before closing her eyes.

Query held her hand tightly. She was going to -kill- that fucking vigilante if anything happened to her partner. She would have -her- wrath, god damnit.

Seeing the henchwomen escape, and hearing the distant wail of sirens, the Wrath and Victor sized off against each other, both panting heavily.

"I can go a few more rounds. I don't care if they take me back to the Asylum. Breaking your neck would be worth it." Victor said, grinning madly.

"Adding you to my tally is gonna be so sweet."

"Don't count on it just yet." The Wrath began, but stopped, cocking his head, something buzzing in his ear. "I see." he said. "Plans have changed. I see you out again I'll kill you for sure, Zsasz."

The Wrath produced a grappling-hook gun from his belt, and fired it off at the nearest building, quickly propelling himself up and away, as the wail of sirens drew closer.

Zsasz found himself standing alone in the plaza, furious. "Fuck." All the henchmen had wisely disappeared. He looked around, before sighting a man-hole cover. Ugh, messy, but better than going back to Arkham just yet. He picked up his cherished blade, smiling to himself. He still had some time, he could add a few more notches to the tally before the cops caught up with him.

He vanished into the sewers below.

* * *

Dawn broke over Gotham City, as Black Friday began. Cold, windswept roads were nonetheless jammed with frantic shoppers, shivering and huddled together in long queues, tightly wrapped in parkas and scarfs, rubbing their hands together as they pressed desperately against shop-windows and into thinly-heated Malls, eager to grab the latest deals.

The GCPD awoke to a double-whammy, as ATF, FBI and DEA agents descended in droves on the city. Commissioner Akins had barely awoken after a long night of drinking and eating turkey with gotham's finest and his extended family when he found his phone jammed with calls from all departments, as well as members of the press. He sighed, wondering if it was not too late to announce an early retirement.

Vicki Vale, eye-witness news reporter for Gotham City Network, was first on the scene at the Museum of Art early that morning, standing outside a hastily erected yellow police-tape, blood and spent bullet-shells still littering the plaza in front of the Museum.

She adjusted her finely coiffured blonde hair, before giving the thumbs up to her camera-man, and began to give her piece.

"Good Morning, Gotham. Last night saw an outrageous crime perpetrated here in the heart of Gotham City. I'm standing outside the Museum of Art, where earlier last night a pitched battle occurred between mysterious henchmen and a vigilante police are calling the Wrath. This masked figure fought for at least several minutes with multiple armed assailants, including wanted Arkham escapee, Victor Zsasz, the notorious Tally-man..."

As she continued, a cold wind blew, ruffling her scarf, a red length of cotton blowing wildly in the wind, and she struggled to maintain her composure, smiling fixedly into the lens.

Elsewhere in Gotham, Barbara awoke with a tired yawn from where she had slept on Ray's couch. Her eyes were still red and sore from crying. It had been a hard night, but she felt the worst of it was past, at least, for now. She could continue to focus on her new obsession, becoming the hero her father had been, and proving all of them, her ungrateful family especially, dead wrong.

She wasn't a monster. She wasn't.

"Ray, you awake yet? Ray?" she called, but there was only silence. She padded into the bed-room, uncertainly, wondering if he was heavily asleep, wary in case he was nude. Grown-ups slept nude sometimes, right?

But Ray wasn't there. A simple, hurried note was on the desk.

EMERGENCY AT WORK. RENEE IN TROUBLE.

SORRY.

-RAY

She frowned, wondering what that was about, before shrugging, and going to make herself some breakfast. If Patricia didn't show up in a few hours, she'd call her on Ray's phone. But for now she ate slowly, and watched the news, and saw Vicki's red scarf blowing madly in the wind.

The Crime of the Century they were calling it. At first the Press was obsessed with the oddity of it, and the dramatic showdown that had occurred. But given how little police presence there was, questions started to be asked.

And that's when the other big event of the night broke the news.

Barbara dropped her spoon, gaping, her eyes wide. It couldn't be...surely...but? And she knew, she knew with grim certainty, that it really was.

The Black Mask's operation had been rumbled, and Gotham Police officer, Captain Renee Montoya, was MIA, presumed dead at his hands. Despite all her care and caution, it was now assumed she was the one who had leaked the documents. Harv Bullock gave a sour "no comment" as he filed into the police station that morning, his face pale and haggard.

There was no sign of Ray.

* * *

So busy and frantic were the events of that day, that almost no-one noticed the arrival of a simple, hand-written letter, delivered to the overloaded desk of the GCPD headquarters, and a similar, but less elegantly written letter, to the former home of Inspector James Gordon.

The mail-man whistled cheerily as he delivered both letters, before getting back into his truck, and driving off, a painfully wide grin on his face as he did so.

This is what the Letter said.

_Lonely_

_Oh so lonely. When the night draws near, and the moon makes it clear, the giggles stop and there's no one to fear. But I'll fix that, oh yes I'll fix that my dear. __One day soon, oh so soon, I will once again be your favourite loon. __Kitty-cat, tit for tat, one of you owes me for that. I've tried so hard, oh so hard, to bring others to my level. __But like the devil, I'm in the details. Look hard enough and you'll find me. Please find me. Soon. Or else there might not be any time left for the party_

_And no one wants that. _

_No. _

_One._

_The Queen of Clubs, the Knave of Spades, and who can forget all the other cards I've played? I'll sing and I'll shout until you've all ran out. __Laughter and screams, what does it mean? __Put your reason away to have one glad day, and hear Gotham as she screams._

_So what will you do?_

_Too much to take in, ah?_

_Oh well, it could be worse._

_People might not even mind._

_Me, though? Little ole' me? I just want a friend._

_Have you ever been alone?_

_Actually, really, genuinely?_

_How about just kinda sad?_

_A sour note or two?_

_Bet you haven't._

_Ah, you think you have._

_Really though, you haven't._

_But that isn't your fault._

_All of us think we know pain, that no one can suffer like we do._

_Really kinda selfish don't you think?_

_Almost too sad to ponder isn't?_

_Gonna go now._

_Oh, don't try to stop me. You'll find me later._

_Right next to the all the smiling people._

_Don't you just want to kiss me?_

_Or do you want to have a lil' more fun than that?_

_Now, now. Hands off._

_But don't worry._

_Really, don't._

_Us freaks gotta stick together._

_Cept, that isn't what you want to be is it?_

_Excellence is just a bit too hard, isn't it?_

_Wanna play?_

_All of us._

_You know you want to._

_No one has to know._

_Especially not her._

_Especially not him, either._

_Now, I know this might sound cruel but gimme a shot!_

_I don't wanna hurt the poor thing._

_Gotta be tough with love though._

_Makes us build character._

_All of us could use a bit of that eh?_

* * *

_Author's Note: "Lonely" was written by collaborator and ideas-man, Michael "Gwynplaine" Shane Rose, whose own profile is linked on mine. Many thanks for your tireless support and creative aid!_


	18. Chapter Seventeen, Gotham Does Not Wait

**ACT TWO:**

**CHAPTER SEVENTEEN**

"_Tributes to the missing police officer, Renee Montoya, continue to pour in as the City Council met today to finalise the creation of a Joint Crime-fighting Task Force, headed up by Congresswoman Amanda Waller. District Attorney Harvey Dent spoke on behalf of the Task Force today when he called for the passage of the Dent Bill, making it compulsory for all members of the Gotham City Police Force to wear a camera and a tracking device, ensuring that their safety and whereabouts when on duty is known and kept track of at all times..."_

The noise of the television was a low buzz, white noise to fill the void. Barbara sat, unmoving, in her living room, long shadows beginning to form as the sun set, its light peeping through the thick curtains and blinds she had drawn.

She sat, staring at a wall, a letter on the table in front of her. Patricia had time-off, and was apparently Christmas shopping for friends and family. Ray was still absent, apparently still busy at work. Five days. Five days since they'd spoken, and wept, and she'd felt like she'd finally gotten somewhere with getting over her shitty family. Then this. Everything. Why couldn't anything ever go right in her life? Why couldn't she just...get better, and feel happy again?

She stirred as her watch beeped the time. Five fifteen. Time to make dinner. She rose, stiffly, from where she had sat, near catatonic, for three hours, the TV buzzing. She walked slowly through the house, ignoring how dim and grey it was getting. She barely acknowledged Fang, her dog, as she carried out the next part of her new daily routine without deviation. Like clock-work, unspeaking, she poured some dog-food out into Fang's bowl, which he gratefully began to devour.

She went over to the stove, her eyes barely seeing anything, her mind in a fog. She once again thought about putting her head inside of that stove. She smiled at the thought. It was electric. No point.

The clock in the kitchen ticked steadily, a new noise that replaced the buzzing in her ears. She turned the oven on, and went to the fridge to get the rest of the casserole from yesterday. She'd barely eaten any of it, so reheating it should be fine. Maybe she would have casserole every day. Another part of her routine.

She sat at the kitchen table, barely breathing or blinking, waiting for this next part of the routine to finish. In her mind, she saw it all, over and over, blending together. The argument with her family. The punch delivered to her brother. The Joker's needle sliding into her arm. Renee's face, cut and bloody. Wills hugging her. The argument with Dr Thompkins. Her needle sliding into her arm, filling her with Miraclo. The punch delivered to her face when she was kidnapped, knocked out by one of the Joker's thugs as she screamed. Her father's face. Faces. Blood. Needles. Violence. Shouting.

It was all blurring together, an endless carousel. She might have been fine, if she hadn't found that damn letter.

If Ray had been around, if he'd come back that day, she'd still have been fine. But he didn't. And so she waited, unsleeping, in her bedroom, her hand gripping a kitchen knife tightly, waiting in the darkness, tears running down her ruined face. Marked by him.

She might have been fine on the second day, but Patricia had needed some time off herself. Her own family troubles were flaring up. So she'd wiped her eyes, and lied. And Lied again. And kept lying. She adopted the routine as a way of sustaining the lie. She thought of the strength in her veins, the punishing exercise routine she'd previously adopted, now cut back to a routine minimum.

Where had that strength gone? She'd been so angry. Now it was all gone. Snuffed out by one letter.

It was a prank. It had to be. Some sick fuck's prank. It was a prank. It was fear.

She'd hidden the letter. She'd thought about asking Patricia, or Ray, or someone. She would have shared it with Ray, definitely. But now she kept it to herself, pouring over the words. The meaning was obvious enough, mostly. She couldn't help but feel she was missing something though. Or maybe all that she was missing was the certainty that this was the random nonsense of a crazy person.

It couldn't be him. And...if it was... She shut her eyes. She sucked in a deep breath. She was not a victim any more. She would be strong. She was never going to stop taking the Miraclo. She was...she was scared.

It was the fifth day, soon to be the sixth. All of Gotham was facing its bleakest winter on record, and the news buzzed constantly, rolling reports. SWAT Raids on the Narrows. The Warehouse District in flames. Gun-battles as ATF descended on the docks, rolling up a significant part of the Black Mask's drugs and arms shipping operations. The FBI seizing his property, and appealing to the embassy of the Canary Islands to freeze his funds. Interpol alerted, a warrant out for Roman Sionis, wanted for an assortment of charges, including the presumed Murder of Renee Montoya.

It was all too much. Everything was moving so fast. And above it all, the haunting reality of the question mark. The defacement of the Art Museum. Prospero. Why. Why? None of it made sense.

A part of her mind longed to focus on the mystery. A part of her would love nothing more than to rush upstairs, log on as Oracle, and begin chasing this white rabbit. To solve it before the FBI could. To catch the Riddler. To save Gotham that way. To show she was strong again, in a real way.

Instead she sat, waiting for the casserole to cook.

The timer pinged. It was done. She got up. Five forty. Twenty minutes to eat, or pretend to eat, her casserole, and then take more of her after-dinner meds. She thought again about swallowing the whole bottle. She smiled. Probably all sugar-pills. No point.

The clock in the kitchen ticked steadily.

* * *

Harv Bullock massaged his tired, aching eyes as the Committee droned on. All of Gotham had been shook up, and everything over the last five days had been a blur, hammer-blow after hammer-blow. He'd been leading the investigation into the vigilante, and suddenly what had been slowly becoming a 3 person operation was now a 30 person operation, mostly liaisons with the FBI. The attack on the Art Museum was being treated as an act of terrorism, possibly connected to the recent exposure of the Black Mask's cartel, which ATF, the DEA and other elements of the FBI were all fighting the mother of all turf wars to get credit for tearing apart.

Meanwhile, at City Hall, and in Washington, the politicians and bureaucrats were scrambling to deliver their finely worded speeches, their calls of action, for justice. The wheels of government turn slowly, but a lot of good people, Harv knew, where now adding plenty of grease, to get those wheels turning a little faster.

Budgets that had been slashed repeatedly for years were now swelling with aid money. The government was promising to ramp up its surplus programme, to outfit the GCPD with left-over military gear, to fund the training and expansion of its SWAT teams. For a year the criminals had slowly reclaimed the night after the fall of the Dark Knight, but now there was real impetus, a sense that they could reclaim things, that the legacy Jim Gordon had wanted to leave was finally, maybe, being picked up.

So why did Harv feel like shit? He crushed a cheap Styrofoam cup in his meaty hands, trying to keep awake. Something about expanding the demand and need for street teams, informers, detectives, getting feelers and eyes out in the street. He didn't much care. He had so much else on his mind.

Detective Kovaleski, a short, petite blonde woman, and one of the transfers who'd arrived in the department just before all hell broke loose, sat next to him, and nudged him back into wakefulness. He must look like shit. He grunted, and tried to pay attention more. His gum-shoe instincts kicked back in. What are the details?

Kovaleski looked nervous, her green eyes betraying her youth and uncertainty. He knew what she was thinking. What everyone must really be thinking. Thoughts he tried to drown out. He glared at the screen, power-point slides clicking over. He reached for a pen, and pretend to take notes, writing out random thoughts and doodles instead.

What the hell -was- going on in Gotham anyway? Who the fuck was this "Wrath" guy? How had he known to be at the Museum? Who was this Riddler fellow? Wills had been burning himself hard before Black Friday trying to chase down this Prospero lead, he knew. Ray probably knew better than anyone what this Riddler deal was, which wasn't much. The graffiti left in the Art Museum implied there'd be at least one more attack, assuming the Oil Rig was definitely his work.

And the timing. The timing with...he swallowed. Everything else. He ruffled his greasy black hair, sighing to himself. Kovaleski shot him a look. She seemed a good kid, he knew. Young. Keen. A bit boyish for his tastes, he preferred his women to be stacked. But as a detective, she seemed to have the right stuff. Maybe it was time he considered early retirement. Streets had taken so much lately.

No, No sleep yet. He suppressed a yawn. He still had work to do. He was supposed to head up the Major Crimes Unit and the Task-force investigating the Art Museum Attack. Though really, the FBI seemed to have that one pretty tightly sewn up, and they weren't too interested in sharing their thoughts or findings with the local rookies. Apparently despite MCU's public shine the FBI privately thought they and everyone else in the GCPD were bumbling amateurs who couldn't find their ass with a map.

Given the way things had been going up till now, he grudgingly had to admit they weren't entirely wrong. Though he'd be damned before he'd admit he and the MCU were anything less than the best god-damn sleuths who ever worked a case.

He blinked, looking down at the mess of notes he'd written. He stiffened, alarmed to see he'd written a name over and over. He swallowed. The stress and lack of sleep must be getting to him. He'd need to cut back on the caffeine pills maybe. Yeah that was it.

Kovaleski seemed to be glancing over at him, concern on her young, tomboyish face. He quickly covered his notepad, like a schoolboy caught writing naughty letters. But what he'd written was far more personal than that.

Renee. Renee Montoya.

His best friend was dead.

The meeting adjourned, and they all got up, taking their coats and notebooks with them. Harv hadn't heard a god-damned word that had been said. He didn't care. He knew what he needed to do.

"Captain Bullock? Sir?" Kovaleski stopped him as they were leaving the door. He turned, scowling at her. Who did this wet behind the ears rookie think she was?

"Detective. Call me Bullock. I'm...the rank isn't me." he said, his voice gravelly and strained. He'd lost two people in a year he felt worthy of calling a Captain. It didn't feel right to be filling their shoes.

"Sir. Respectively, but you look like shit. You need some rest." She spoke boldly. Her tone and confidence only drove the knife deeper. She reminded him too much of her.

"I can cover for you the rest of today and tomorrow. Go home, sleep it off."

Bullock stiffened. Any other department, any other situation, any other time, he and a thousand other grumpy bosses would have chewed her out for insubordination, thrown the book at her for her over-familiarity. And nine hundred and ninety nine times out of a thousand, they'd have been absolutely right.

But he didn't do that. He nodded instead. Christ, he really was losing his edge.

"I want a full report on the new informers on my desk, double-spaced, tomorrow morning. I'm going to...check some other leads." he grunted, not holding her gaze. She simply nodded. "Of course sir."

He pushed past her, his eyes feeling like heavy weights. The whole day seemed a blur. He couldn't remember much of the rest of it, but he managed to get all the way to his car before passing out on the back-seat. He wasn't the first detective to take such an on-shift nap, but mercifully no-one noticed, or at least took steps not to notice.

Kovaleski, for her part, returned to the office-space, and sat herself down in Harv's empty desk-space. She looked through his papers and opened up his laptop, shaking her head at his laxity, but figuring he'd appreciate her putting together things for him. There was a hot cup of Booster Gold Blend waiting next to the laptop. She was puzzled at who would buy such expensive coffee. The writing scribbled on it didn't seem familiar either. She shrugged, and pushed the cup away. She had a report to write. She slicked back her pale-blonde hair with fingers, and got to work typing. An e-mail arrived after an hour or so. Wills wanted to meet Harvey later tonight. She sent back a curt reply, saying that the Captain was indisposed right now, but she would be happy to meet him in his office.

He cancelled the appointment fifteen minutes later, and she thought no more of the matter. Let the old dogs nurse their wounds, she thought. Gotham was full of the corrupt and the tired. It needed new blood, go-getters with ambition and ruthless efficiency. She was determined to be one of them.

She worked late into the night, and left with a thin smile. If she didn't find this Wrath before the New Year, she'd eat her badge out of shame.

* * *

Thomas Wayne sighed, doffing his gloves, washing his hands in a bowl of water. Blood, so much blood. He looked at the cracked mirror, seeing an old, old man staring back. Grey-hairs consumed his thinning hairline, a few strands of white here and there also. He'd given up trying to look distinguished and merely "50" a long time ago. He scrubbed his hands vigorously, using plenty of anti-septic gel.

Old habits died hard, he supposed. He fetched paper-towels, and dried his liver-spotted, wrinkled hands off meticulously. Throwing the paper-towels into the bathroom bin, he went back outside, to darkened room, the shutters and blinds drawn, and the acrid, coppery stench of blood.

"Alright. I'm done." he said curtly to the woman waiting anxiously, sitting on an 18th century chair like it was a recliner. "I did what was asked. God knows this isn't the first time I've done things like this. Now I want to know why you came here, to me. Don't give me a bullshit story neither. There's plenty of crooked doctors in the Narrows, and there's far closer."

He pulled his sleeves back, and reached for the ivory-handled cane he'd left aside. He didn't really need the cane to walk, but at his age it was always good to have an extra weapon close to hand. He looked over at Alfred, whose composure was total, despite wearing a blood-stained apron and gloves, much as Thomas himself had been a few moments earlier.

"You can wash up in the bathroom yourself Alfred. I don't think they mean us harm." he smiled cynically.

Katherine Kane glared at him, almost forgetting for a moment the gun she had been holding, her fingers and knuckles white. Had she been holding it all this time? She blinked. It seemed the lack of sleep was getting to her again.

"You know why we- I- came to you. There's no-one else we can trust with...with this." She said, shaking, her vision blurring. She was a former marine, damn it. She could take a little sleep deprivation. Then again, four or five days was -alot- of sleep deprivation. She blinked, reaching into her jacket-pocket for another pill, but finding they were all gone. She was sure she had had more!

Thomas shook his head, sighing. "And where do you think this goes from here, mm? How do you explain everything after what happened? As far as the world outside is concerned, she's dead. And if she turns up alive, what then? You can't vanish off the face of the earth without leaving a body. Believe me, others have tried."

She yawned heavily, the gun thudding to the ground from her hand. "I...I don't really care what the world thinks. What matters is that she's alive now. Right?" she asked, still a little uncertain.

"She'll live. For now. But one wonders if she'll thank you for what you've done." Thomas gritted his teeth. "That one as a Death Wish as bad as any I've seen."

"And that's something else you know about, right? Ray...Ray told me. He said that you-"

"Hush, now. That's over. Long over. Though it seems your...friend here didn't get the memo. But, if what's going on right now is any indication...maybe it shouldn't have." He sighed, rubbing his eyes. Tired, but also old. So much had been lost, and now this.

Katherine got to her feet, unsteadily. "I'm...I'm going somewhere, to sleep. Don't...don't try anything, you hear? I guess we...we have to trust you, now." she sighed deeply herself, a sigh that became another yawn. "Dammit...what happened to my...pills..." She collapsed onto the floor, completely fatigued, though Thomas got there quickly, helping her up.

"Damn fool women. Even when this was a man's game it was foolish." he grumbled. "Alfred! Help Miss Kane here back to the guest bed-room." he sighed, turning back to his patient.

Renee Montoya lay in bed, pale as death, wires and tubes running into her. Her chest was heavily bandaged, and a series of jury-rigged, scavenged HRE monitors and other medical equipment were rigged up on the night-stand. This really wasn't the first time he'd had to fix up gun-shot wounds on the sly.

But it had never been this close. He breathed easy. Every-time he was afraid his hands would slip, his heart would seize. Every-time he swore it would be the last time. All those lives saved, all those impossible operations preformed flawlessly. Years of patching up Jim Gordon and himself, even his son. Every time it was someone else he remembered. The one life he couldn't save. The only life that had ever mattered a damn to him.

He coughed wearily, sitting close by Renee's bedside. "I don't know if you can hear me, but let an old man ramble for a bit, will you?" he chuckled sardonically to himself. Renee lay, practically motionless, a weak, but steady beep monitoring her heart. She'd lost almost all her blood, and he'd had to pull a lot of favours to get enough of her type rushed in a freezer, no records, no questions asked to deal with it. He'd tided her over with donations from Alfred, but as willing as the butler had been Thomas couldn't afford to make him woozy or sick. He needed the old boy's steady hands to help him with the surgery.

It had been touch and go for a few days, but he finally felt certain that she was going to pull through. But what happens now? When she awoke, how would she deal with the consequences of her actions? He didn't know. He thought again of the life he had led, and the fool-hardy experiment he'd reluctantly condoned. He'd been angry when he'd realised Bruce was giving Barbara that damn Miraclo drug. Jim had never used it. Never needed it. He grimaced. But it was hard not to see Bruce's point.

He shook his head. "My son...my son has wanted for the longest time to be this city's hero. He can't do it the way you did. He needed...wanted...to be a symbol. I sometimes wonder if he'd have ended up as a Detective, like you, if...things had been different. He's always had a keen mind. But what you did...I'm afraid what example you've set, Miss Montoya. Gotham wasn't ready for another vigilante so soon. At least you had the sense to keep it quiet..." he sighed.

"But I suppose Gotham doesn't wait for anyone." He got up, rubbing his aching back and joints. How had he gotten so old so fast? It seemed like only yesterday he'd been swinging around on a grappling hook, running the rooftops, a cowl swept out behind him.

There was a cough behind him, and he turned, eyes widening. Awake already? Renee opened a swollen, battered eye cautiously, but didn't seem able to talk. That and she had a tube down her throat.

But she didn't need to say words. As her eyes focused, she saw him standing there in the evening gloom. She blinked, and her gaze said it all.

"You're welcome." he said, sighing. Well, maybe she didn't want to die after all. Which meant he had to find someone else to carry on this damn legacy. He rubbed his arm. There really was only one possible choice.

He limped down the corridor, making sure to close the door fast behind him. The servants knew better than to enter this place. Martha's place, he knew. The only quiet part of Wayne Manor, and the only place he could safely treat Montoya in secrecy.

No, time was running out. And the ghost that haunted him demanded new blood. Gotham needed a protector, and it didn't care for an old man's sentimentality. He located a servant, a maid woman waiting nervously at the foot of the stairs.

"Get me a telephone. I need to ring the Gordon Residence."


End file.
